Wrong Place, Wrong Time

This past week went by well all things considered. We had a state trooper shot in the line of duty twice by a male fleeing in a vehicle. Thankfully the trooper will be just fine.

Sunday, I responded to a call of a juvenile hit by a vehicle. Earlier in the day before I came to work, I had paid attention to the calls we had in the area where I work and I remembered seeing another juvenile hit by a car. It was a male in the roadway who was hit by a passing motorist when he darted into traffic. A report was completed and the male went along his way. A few hours later, the teen was at home with his mom when he passed out for no apparent reason. She naturally called 911 saying her son who had been hit by a car was not alert or conscious. We arrive on scene and the teen had come back to his normal self. The rookie officer who was primary on the call began to get his information for his report when I started to ask some questions and sensing this might be the same call that I saw earlier. It turned out I was correct and I ended up saving the rookie tons of paperwork! Mom and son then took an ambulance ride to the children's hospital to make sure things were ok.

Monday, I responded to a roommate dispute. Two roommates who had lived together for years finally had a falling out and one was moving on. The roommate who was staying locked the door and refused to let her come in the apartment to get her stuff. It's one thing when you want someone out but it's another when you don't want them to get their stuff to leave. I arrive on scene and the staying-put roommate was telling me how much she wanted her now ex-roommate to move on. I had to explain how crazy it sounded to want her to leave but then refuse....It took awhile but she finally realized the craziness too and we got the ball rolling.

Tuesday, I responded to a city park where some contractors had been doing some construction work. It had been raining recently and this was the first day they had managed to come back to work. When they arrived, they found their $50,000 compact loader-excavator missing. We reviewed the footage and found a white jaguar roll up and two men get out. They walk around and examine the machinery and then a wrecker arrives with two more men. It takes the men about two hours but they finally load up this expensive excavator onto the wrecker and drive off. We managed to get the company name and number off the wrecker so hopefully it'll become a good lead for the detective.

Wednesday, I was ALMOST done with my shift when a business robbery pops up at convenience store on a nearby beat. I'm the first unit on scene and my job is to make sure the business is safe, find witnesses, and lock the store down so nobody goes in or out. I find two patrons playing the video gambling machines in addition to the clerk. The second officer starts talking to the clerk while I'm gathering the information from the two guys. It's a pair of cousins who had their car break down in the parking lot and they were waiting on roadside assistance to come help them out. They saw the robber come in, heard his voice, saw his face, and could describe the gun. They were excellent witnesses. I got their information but one of the guys did not have his ID. I had him write the usual, his name and date of birth. He only wrote his name. I then had him again, write his DOB and he only writes the year. I was starting to get suspicious and after I got the rest of his birthday, had an officer watch him.

I ran to my car to run the guy and found out he had an active felony warrant for a probation on felony possession of marijuana (to add irony to it all, the guy was Jamaican.) I held the guy in the backseat of my car until the commercial robbery detective arrived on scene and he was still willing to talk to the detective. The guy was very appreciative of me for being nice to him and I even gave him a red bull from the store to drink. The warrant ended up being confirmed and I took him on down to the county jail. When it was all said and done, I got off work almost two hours late. Just another day in the police life.

"Professional" Driver

So the week ended up nicely. I took a trainee out  Tuesday for his last day in the zone before he started his last rotation before going solo. Our first call out the gate was a vehicle accident which technically occurred on private property. I let the trainee handle it.

There was a exit row to the parking lot which technically is just for one vehicle. A commercial water truck was exiting and preparing to take a wide right turn when a small car came up alongside it thinking the truck was going to turn anywhere but right. The truck made its right turn and the driver heard a crunch as he ripped off the entire front of the (brand new) small car. The accident was technically the fault of the car driver for not yielding to the car turning which was in front of it. We couldn't write any tickets due to it being on private property but the man was upset he was being listed at fault. The poor water truck driver was just thankful his boss wasn't going to yell at him for not making his deliveries. The truck held up like a beast with no damage.

Wednesday, I handled a call for a car theft. When I arrived at the apartment the lady had no idea what her tag was or her VIN. She tried calling her insurance company but the policy she thought she had, didn't even include the car that was missing. Not to mention the car had been missing for three days before she decided to call 911. She was then surprised I couldn't take the report without the car information....

Thursday, I was sitting near the drive-thru of a fast food restaurant on my beat. It was near the end of the shift and I was running tags trying to kill some time. I saw a van that belonged to a private transportation company. The vehicle had a brake light that was out so I decided to pull it over and see what I could get out of the stop. The female driver (who drives for a living) did not have her driver's license on her when I stopped her. I decided not to give her a ticket for the brake light but wrote her for the license not being on her behind the wheel. She was surprised I would actually write a ticket for that and started to put up a fight but I told her how to take care of the ticket and she was extremely appreciative. Not to mention it's the cheapest ticket you can get in my state!

Broken Homes and Broken Systems

      Sunday this week ended with me getting off work late. I got a call about a found runaway juvenile. A mother reported her son a runaway the day before and received a phone call from her mother that the kid showed up at her place. This kid is 13 years old and on probation for stealing multiple cars. He wears an ankle monitor as well and when mom reported him missing-it violated his probation leading to a possible warrant.


I entered the apartment and found the kid sleeping wrapped up completely in blankets. I put him in cuffs and got him some clothes since it was freezing outside. It turned out he didn't have a warrant and was just taken off the system as a missing person and released to mom. I got a chance to talk to him without his mom though and he told me he didn't want to be at home for multiple reasons and was going to ask the court to be placed into a group home but he was deathly afraid of how his mom would feel when she was told his wishes. I tried to get the reason out of him but he refused to tell me why. It's a shame that a 13 year old in and out of the system already would be in a situation where he willingly wanted to move to a group home for delinquent kids...

Monday, ended with another kid call. I received a call about a 14 year old mentally unstable kid who was off his meds and being violent. I pulled up to the house as the kid was trying to run away from his mom. I grabbed him and pulled him into the house. He stormed to his room and said he was not going anywhere. He got mad at his mom because he ran away from home while under house arrest for calling in bomb threats to his middle school. As a result, mom cancelled his cell phone service and he went ballistic. When the paramedics arrived, he refused to be seen by them and I could see the signs of a fight brewing. I grabbed him and as soon as I touched him he tried fleeing out the house. I wrestled with him and got him into cuffs. We dragged him to the back of the ambulance where the paramedics had to deliver two medical sedation shots as he wrestled and fought best he could. Once both were administered we had to hold him down as he was strapped heavily to the stretcher for his own safety. This kid was diagnosed with three different mental disorders at 14.

I've always said the two systems in almost every state that need to be on their game are child services and mental health. Often both are lacking. These kids are the product of a failed system. If only more could be done.

Twin Games

It's starting to get a bit colder in my city. I think this winter finally caught up to us.

Sunday, I did a traffic stop on a car that was registered to a female with a suspended license. I pulled the vehicle over and it appeared the driver was not the one I was looking for but instead was the twin sister of who I was looking for. Now as a police officer, we're often skeptical of things. So I had to try and find a way to figure out if this was the right twin or the wrong twin. I looked up the suspended twin on the department database and found a time she was a victim of a crime. I had the driver tell me about the incident and she was able to perfectly without hesitation. A minor incident in which only the one sister would know from a few years back. It turned out ok and she went on her way!

Monday, I actually took a much needed day off to spend with the girlfriend and her daughter. It's always good to still have that good personal time to yourself in this job.

Tuesday, I responded to a domestic dispute at a residence. The female stated her live-in boyfriend threw an air freshener can at her and then grabbed her and shook her. It all started because the boyfriend is a pastor of a church and had a church member coming over for relationship advice (ironic huh?) when he told her to put on some clothes that weren't "hoe-ish". She got upset and he threw the can at her. He admitted to letting the anger get the best of him but denied grabbing and shaking her. I was taking the pastor out of his house in handcuffs as the church member arrived to get him from him about issues with his wife....

Wednesday, I was coming back from the jail when I ran a temporary tag that appeared to be expired. I ran it but my computer was slow and I didn't get the hit back that it was expired until after the car had turned into a gas station. I did a U-turn and went to look for the vehicle that had just circled the lot and come right back out. I did the traffic stop and approached the vehicle. It was occupied four times and everyone had an ID except for one of the rear passengers. I had him write down his information and he wrote down his name and his birthday (coincidentally he wrote down the current date). I ran everybody but I ran him first. Nothing came back with the information he gave me but a warrant hit came back with the information he gave as an alias for an armed and dangerous fugitive known to be on drugs. I immediately detained him and asked him why he lied to me. He told me he was sorry and then I told him he had two warrants from two different counties. He knew about one of the warrants and he told me that's why he lied. He ended up taking the ride for lying to me and then the two warrants (one being a felony warrant). Luckily his actual birthday was the day before. That's all he was grateful for was that he got to go to a steakhouse instead of have a baloney sandwich at the jail for a birthday meal.

Thursday, I had a trainee and we responded right out of the gate to a working fight on the other sector during shift change. By the time we got there, the mom of the household managed to calm her daughter and her female partner down and separate the two parties. She told me that the kids were crying and a mess as a result of the fight. I quickly went to my trunk and pulled out some stuffed animals for the kids to help get their mind off of watching their mom fight. They immediately lit up and the family wanted to take pictures of me with the kids and said I was "nice 12" for helping out the kids. Gotta love helping out some kids caught in the middle of a situation!

The Last Week of 2015

So the final week of 2015. Everyone is coming back from vacation from the Christmas holiday and getting ready for a night of partying with family or out to ring in the new year.

My last call of the day on Sunday was one of these such people. It was an airman who just came back from vacation and found his trailer for his motorcycle had been stolen from the parking lot. Thankfully his motorcycles were inside of his garage and he didn't lose those. He had a really good insurance company through the military and really just needed a report to cover the loss. He had taken every step to even install an anti-theft device onto the hitch so nobody could just come and hook up the trailer. I guess where there is a will, there's a way.

Monday, I responded to the mall on my beat for a trespasser who was detained. I get there and it was a guy who was caught shoplifting on the property at a department store (for perfume no less) and issued a trespass warning. He was caught back on the property selling bootleg DVDs in the food court. When I arrived to place him under arrest he flat out told me he didn't "give a fuck about the trespass warning". So needless to say he went to jail. He was smart about the DVDs though. He had the cases for movies still in the theaters but the DVDs were in a bag and blank so it was hard to make the correlation and he caught a pass on the felony (which he had previously been convicted for).

Tuesday, I responded to what came in as a working dispute with a gun. Two males were going at it in a driveway and one of them was known to have a pistol on him. I get there and the whole family is yelling and going at it. I call for more units to help calm down the situation and find out these facts. Male #1 was bringing over his baby momma to her family's house. They arrive but the girl's brother does not like male #1 because he supposedly beats on her and he owes her $15.....So he's arguing and supposedly threatened to shoot him and beat him up.

I pull aside the brother who admitted to saying he was going to beat up male #1 but vehemently denied the gun part. I noticed the uncle of male #1 quiet and standing away from the loud family. I go up to him and he finally agrees to tell me what happened after some persuasion. He stated the brother DID in fact mention the gun and how he was going to shoot him. The brother was then arrested for terroristic threats. Sometimes you have to pay attention to the whole scene to find your clues and real witnesses.

Wednesday, I had to respond to a business alarm at a closed daycare. I get there and this daycare has what looks like an impenetrable, very tall fence all the way around the entire property and then barbed wire along the back. This was like baby Fort Knox. There was no way I could enter in and check the exterior of the building. I'll tell you one thing, if I had kids, I would definitely want them going there.

Thursday (New Year's Eve), I was working 12 hour shifts as a detail car. My job was to take people to jail. I helped back up the other detail car on a traffic stop. I pull up and he has a male and female out of a car. He tells me he was riding behind the car when the smell of weed started flooding through his AC in the patrol car. He pulled the stop and before the car came to a stop the male tossed something out of the window. We had another unit come to watch the couple as we searched the car and found the weed in the cup holder. It was a VERY small amount and so the officer decided to just write a citation to the male (who was driving) for the weed as it was in his cup holder. The male was dumbstruck and did not/could not believe the weed smell would float through the AC. It happens more times than you can imagine.

Christmas In the Streets 2015

Since creating this blog, this is Christmas in the Streets Volume II. The craziness continues on as people got ready for the holidays.

Sunday, I was dropping off someone with a warrant at City Jail when an inmate got into a dispute with the jail doctor. The inmate was being medically evaluated by the doctor when he yelled at the doctor to release him. the doctor told the guy he was only responsible medically for him and could not help him legally. The guy got upset and spit on the doctor. Our city corrections officers aren't like deputies that work in county jails, so they need us to place charges on people. Guess who was the lucky officer who got stuck to help since I was the only one there? I guess there's always a first time to arrest someone inside of a jail.

Monday, I was on a traffic stop where I arrested a guy for a suspended license. While I was on my traffic stop, we had a our regular "Bike Life" crew (a combination of illegal dirt bike and ATV riders who just ride around recklessly on city streets doing stunts), drive past me. They know our hands our tied by our city council and we can't chase them. That being said they love to ride past us on traffic stops basically doing whatever the hell they want to. I and every one of my coworkers hate it. We pretty much have to catch them when they crash, run out of gas, or break down...

Tuesday, I helped back up an officer from our traffic unit on a stop where the tag was not coming back to the vehicle. I came up along the passenger side and saw the driver had a handgun just lying on the passenger seat. In my state that's perfectly legal however still a potential threat. I called out to the officer with our signal for weapon and he acknowledged he had no idea it was there. The power of an extra set of eyes on a traffic stop is invaluable. Especially if the guy wanted to be a threat. I easily would have seen it and have been able to react way before he would have.

Wednesday, I responded to an open door call. A lady was coming home with her toddler and pulled into her driveway to notice her garage door was open and the door to inside of her house from the garage was unlocked. She was worried somebody might still be in the home. I rushed lights and sirens to the house and waited for my backup unit before we made entry. We proceeded to clear this awfully big house room by room. We had just finished training for active shooter so we got to use some of the room clearing skills we added to our arsenal. Thankfully, as soon as we made entry I noticed the homeowner's laptop on the kitchen table. That would have been the first thing taken. Sure enough, no burglary occurred and the family could sleep in peace coming up on Christmas Eve the next day.

Thursday (Christmas Eve), it just POURED. Accidents left and right. However, on a day where most people were settling down with their families, I got a call for a suicidal male armed with a knife. I got to the apartment complex where he was located and he came towards my direction hands visible telling me he wanted to go to the hospital. He already had a cut to his right arm where he tried to cut himself. The paramedics arrived on scene and he was a willing patient. I just had to pat him down first and make sure he didn't have the knife before I put him in the back of the ambulance with them. It's always sad when someone is so depressed on what is typically a great and joyous day.