The fast and the furious!

This past week was a lot of fun at work. We had at least 7 pursuits and all of them turned out really good. Our department is very aggressive about pursuits and we train a lot regarding when to pursue, when we shouldn't, and when to safely use techniques to stop the bad guy car. And a lot of the responsibility lies on the shoulders of the sergeant. We are the ones who make all of the final decisions, and we are the ones that have to answer to the Chief!
Some departments only pursue on violent felonies. Some departments don’t pursue at all! They are afraid of the liability. But our troops are highly trained and our policies help us make sound decisions. Plus we always outweigh the need to catch the person versus the seriousness of the crime. We also factor in traffic, road, pedestrian, officer ability, and time of day conditions.
A few years ago we found a stolen car at a local motel and while our guys were watching it a girl ran out, jumped in it and took off. We chased her for a few minutes but when she started flying though intersections and red lights at high speeds we terminated the pursuit. It was only a stolen car so it wasn’t worth anyone getting hurt so we shut down the pursuit. Unfortunately the female kept going and she got into a bad accident. Of course the suspect lived and was only sentenced to about 10 years in prison!
Well one of our pursuits this week almost went bad. Our officers chased a guy in a stolen car that was high on crack. We later learned that his female passenger was also helping him smoke crack during the pursuit! Can you believe that!?! Anyway, my guys chased him up this hill and by the time I got into the area I decided to wait at the bottom in case he turned around. It’s a long hill on the west side of the city with two lanes in each direction and divided by a cement jersey barrier. Well the bad guy did turn around and decided to go back down.... on the wrong side of the road! Our officers terminated the pursuit at that point because it was now too dangerous for the public. Luckily I was at the bottom waiting and had traffic blocked off. I wasn’t going to allow this guy to kill someone because he wanted to smoke crack on his off time! Somehow on his own he ended up crashing before he got to me. I guess crack and driving don’t mix! I don’t recommend it either! =) So we all ran up there and removed him from the vehicle and took him into custody.
And right after that high adrenaline call I had to take a citizen complaint where a lady called in to complain because one of my officers refused to park a police vehicle in front of her home at night. Some people!

Gotta question?

I thought I would open up this post to any questions anybody has for the police. I'll answer any question... good, bad or ugly. Questions like... what does POPO stand for... or why do cops speed... or do cops really eat donuts... worst call.. best call... how do you get out of a ticket... whatever. If nobody has any ?'s then no biggie and I will move on to the next post. Have fun!

The apple doesn't fall far from the tree!

I think I previously mentioned that we were having a burglary problem on the east side and it appears the trend is going down. We have identified most of the players and they are getting busted almost daily. The problem is that most of them are juveniles and get out of jail the very next day, that’s if the juvenile detention center even takes them at all. But the other day we see three of our local burglars walking around the area of a recent burglary so we go out to contact them. Sure enough they take off running through some apartments and into the woods. The younger officers take off on foot after them and the older and wiser officers (me) get in their car and drive after them. Well eventually the thieves tire out and after running all over creation we catch them. It sure is tough to out run the radio!
Anyway, after talking to the suspects we discover that they were visiting another local burglar who lives in the complex they just ran through. This suspect is the guy they take the stolen property too so he is of big interest to the police. So we decide to go talk to the parents and have a “chat” about how we can solve this problem. It was clear that we were going there to send the “appropriate message” that this problem is going to stop one way or another. But as the new sergeant I needed to be cordial and come from a position of offering assistance to the parents. At least that was my goal. My troops knock on the door and the father, who does not live in the home, answers. He’s an older but very big man. He is pretty cooperative and we ask to speak to his son. Naturally he wants to know why so we tell him and I ask if I can step inside to speak with him while my officers talk to the son. The dad agrees but appears leery and keeps an ear out for the other conversation….. And so do I.
I overhear the kid being disrespectful and since the dad is letting his son get away with this I chime in and explain to the kid about respect. Well dad starts to take offense to this. When one of my officers speaks up about it the dad gets distracted so I just stand there looking around the home for stolen property. Well another kid comes downstairs and picks something up from a table and makes noise. The dad thinks I grabbed it and starts arguing with me. Thankfully the other kid admitted to doing it but I didn’t like being accused of something I didn’t do. I mean I was standing right next to him and right next to the front door. Anyway, my officer starts to speak to the dad about his 17 y/o son hanging out with 14 y/o girl and the dad gets seriously mad. The officer looks like he’s a 17 y/o so it was kind of funny but the dad starts arguing and yelling. I try to explain that we were there to help but he yells at me to get out of his home. I notice that his son has a home detention ankle bracelet on so I ask the dad what it was for. Can you take a guess? Yep, burglary! So I tell the dad that it’s not by accident we are there and he should be doing something about his son. Now things go south really fast.
He yells “get the ‘blank’ out of my house” and reaches out to grab my arm. I tell him to don’t even think about touching me and I tell him of course I will leave. He again accuses me of taking something and yells at me for lecturing him. He says “I don’t need some punk ‘blankity’ cop lecturing me about my son” and he adds “I’ve been to prison!” Like that is supposed to impress me or something. I told him that I disagreed and pointed to his son’s bracelet. He didn’t like that either.
We are now outside near the garage door and he then goes into a tirade of insults and expletives toward me and is yelling at the top of his lungs so the whole world can hear. He again yells at me to leave and I told him we aren’t inside but he replies that I am on his property. I quickly explain that they rent the apartment, don’t own it, he doesn’t even live there and we are out in front in the home in the complex, not on his property. After I warn him about using profanity he is now ready to fight. He squares off at me and does a quick pull on his pants as if he is going to do something. So I stand there and call his bluff and ask him “what are you going to do now?” He says “I’m a convicted felon, I’m not afraid to fight the police.” Well in the end he just goes back to yelling so I leave him with this comment. “The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree!

I’m back everyone!

I took a little break from bloggin because I was pretty busy and I was out of town for a week. So here’s what I’ve been up to lately.....
Well most of you know that I got promoted to sergeant the other day so life is really good right about now. We had a big promotion ceremony where four new officers were sworn in, and then three of us were promoted, and then we had one officer retire after 33 years of service. It was pretty cool. And the best part was that my wife secretly had a bunch of my friends show up that have been a big support to me throughout the years. I didn’t even know they were there until I got up to get my new badge and when I looked out I saw everyone. It was pretty cool. She is such a sweetheart! I love that she is my biggest fan.
Jessica actually went on another ride-a-long with me the other day and we had a blast. We got to drive around for 10 hours and just hang out and talk and connect. She even got to meet a prostitute. She heard the call and said that she wanted to go see her so we drove up there and Jess got to say some nice things to her. She really wanted to pray for her but she was too chicken to ask! Actually, she really didn’t get the chance to but maybe next time. So we just kept driving around having fun looking for bad guys. And of course the whole day surrounded around food. That’s my sweetie! That girl literally eats more than I do. I just don’t get it. Moving on....
Last week I got to go to Oregon for CDU training, which is riot training, with about 10 of our officers and a total of about 60 officers from 6 different agencies. It was a total blast! We marched around a mock city practicing riot techniques on people. We used tear gas and smoke grenades and swung big sticks. We slept in military barracks during the week and had fun doing guy stuff in the evenings. Of course the week was surrounded by practical jokes and funny stories. My job in the unit is a team leader for the red squad which means that I have a number of guys on my team and we are part of a big giant team. We basically march around and look tough and wait for the green light to go in and restore order when needed. So that whole week was fun and exciting.
I’ll close with the story of the week. My guys were called to a local motel where the manager found a woman dead in the bathtub. Apparently she died in the tub which overflowed with water and leaked out into the hallway which got the attention of the manager. He went inside and found her and called 911. My guys go in and see her in the tub but don’t really want to disturb the scene for the detectives but they called for medics per policy anyway. Well just as the medics arrive, the woman sits up in the bathtub! Just like in a horror movie! I guess she wasn’t so dead after all. The real story was that she had wayyyyyyyyyyyyyyy too much to drink the night before and passed out in the tub while trying to take a bath. She’s lucky she didn’t drown! But she was still messed up from all the alcohol and had to go to the hospital anyway. Pretty crazy, huh?!