It had become a daily practice that the chief called me into his office, wanting to watch my dashcam and listen to the audio mini cassette tape from my shirt pocket because yet another person told the chief that I was way too brutal in giving out speeding tickets, or had executed police brutality in making an arrest, but one of those complaints was about to backfire in a big way. I had to work over four hours due to a call off from the night shift. At midnight I pulled over one of those giant K-5 Chevy Blazers that was weaving all over the road.
The driver got out. He was a tall, white teenage male. He was unsteady on his feet. Because of his driving, the scent of alcohol and his unsteady footing, I told him that I suspected him of drunk driving and I would like to have him do some sobriety tests. "No need" he said, "I'm drunk!"
I cuffed him, had his truck towed and took him to the station where he blew a .17 A little while later I took him to the county jail.
The next morning at 8, my phone rang. Angrily, all the chief said was "Bring in your tapes!!"
I showed the chief my tapes, which made him have a huge belly laugh. The chief then told me that at around seven, he bonded out of the county jail, went directly to the chief and told him that he had been driving home from bible study and was on his way to give his mother flowers when I pulled him over for no reason. That I dragged him from his truck, started beating on him, knocking him to the ground, kicking him repeatedly in the nuts while calling his mother all kinds of names. When the chief stopped laughing, he said "The judge wants to see your tapes as well."
Ten days later the teen had his day in court. He stood there with his girlfriend and mother and in front of everyone in the room repeated his cock and bull story. The judge turned to me and said "Officer?" I pressed play on the VCR hooked up to the courtroom TV. While his mother and girlfriend looked on in total shock, he hit STOP on the VCR, turned to the judge and said "I'd like to change my plea."
"Most wise" the judge said, "considering that you committed perjury in MY courtroom!!"
Over the next twenty minutes the judge chewed him up one side and down the other, then gave him the maximum on a first offense DWI (fine, suspension of license, a year of probation and community service).
A little over a week later, the situation with the gang took an unexpected turn. Max, John and I responded to a disturbance at a gang hideout. Upon arrival, it was an absolute free for all. The three of us pulled apart the combatants, but there were two girls that just would not stop fighting. Both were cuffed. One was put in my unit and the other was placed in John's unit. We drove back to the station and placed the girls in the booking room (the booking room had cuffs that were chained to the wall).
About ten minutes later Max called for an ambulance. He had found one of the gang members in a roadside ditch. The kid was badly wounded. I got an idea and asked John to take care of the girls and I drove out to the site where EMT's worked on the kid. I told Max my idea and since it was close to the end of shift, Max allowed it.
I followed the ambulance to the hospital and started to camp out in the ER. The boy's family showed up a half hour later. Shortly afterward, the boy was transferred to a hospital room and we followed. I bought coffee for the family and consoled them. When the boy came out of his stupor I went and bought juice for him and spoke to him about the gang. The boy told me that the gang leader attacked and beat on him for not selling drugs in school. I asked the boy if he wanted to press charges and the answer, with his family's blessing, was yes.
The boy was released at dawn. I went back to the police station and wrote a report. I then drove to the DA's office and presented the report to a deputy DA. Days later, the case was presented in front of a grand jury. With an arrest warrant in hand, with two shifts officers, as well as the lieutenant, we drove over to the house where the gang hung out. We arrested the gang leader and found a bunch of stolen goods (TV's, VCR's and stereos). The next morning, the gang leader was arraigned in front of the municipal judge where a 5,000.00 bail was set. Ten days later, there was a trial in the municipal court and the boy was the star witness. The gang leader was sentenced to three years in prison, which was the maximum that the judge could give. This case was tried in municipal court because all of us, most especially me, had major issues with the magistrate judge.
The first report that I took in the PD was the ex-wife of the bail bondsman, stalking and harassing him. On two occasions, we had an address on her and on both occasions, we found that she had skedaddled just minutes before our arrival. On both occasions, the arrest and search warrants were signed by the magistrate just before we went to the locations where she was hiding out. Our only conclusion was that someone in the magistrate judge's office was calling the woman and telling her that the police were on the way. In addition, I had lost eight straight DWI cases in front of that judge (all 2nd, 3rd and higher offense DWI cases had to be tried in front of him), despite having dashcam and audio tape evidence as well as breathalizer results. Angry after losing the eighth case I went home and turned on the TV. Montel Williams was interviewing two women from Mothers Against Drunk Driving and a light bulb went on in my head.
I contacted the local MADD office and told them what was going on. On my next DWI case, I introduced the woman from the MADD office to the judge and told him that "She will be here to observe and take notes." Knowing he was now under the microscope, the judge actually acted like a judge instead of an activist. The defendant looked truly shocked when he was found guilty.
The burglaries in the village dropped from about 2.5 a day to about 1 or 2 a week, but still, the number two guy in the gang (the only other adult-the rest were juveniles) was still on the loose and that's when the worst burglary took place. A gun collector, definitely not a believer in locking up his trove, had 50 rifles, shotguns and handguns stolen from the walls of his house. That's when the gang took a powder and disappeared from sight. They didn't even go to school.
Finally, one of the juveniles in the gang was caught shoplifting in a store. We took him to the station and right away, he started asking for food. When we wouldn't give him food (unless he gave up where the gang was hiding) he became silent, asking either for food or to go to juvie. We just left him in the booking room. I offered to buy him a burger combo in return for the information, but still he wouldn't budge. Finally, after six hours, he broke. It was shift change, and we all hustled over to the alleged hideout, only to find that it had been abandoned at least a week (maggots were eating food left behind). We finally just took the kid to juvie.
A couple of weeks later I was leaving work in my civilian car (my take home patrol unit was in for maintenance). I was at a red light and the number two guy in the gang pulled up next to me. He took a healthy swig from a whiskey bottle, looked over and saw me. I was one block from the police station and already talking on the radio when he saw me. While he was being booked, it turned out that he had a sexual assault warrant from another county and we had connected him, through fingerprints, to four burglaries. Now, the gang was completely without leadership and burglaries became pretty much non existent. Something had to give and eleven months after I joined the PD, it did give.
It all started at 12:40 on a Sunday afternoon. I was looking forward to going home. The only other cop I was working with was one of the fat slugs. A girl, member of the gang, ran into the police station and stated (I'm paraphrasing here) that she feared for her life. She added that she was at a local market and she saw a car filled with gang members from another town that were flashing gang signs at her.
So, I drove over to the market and I was looking through the parking lot when dispatch notified me of a shooting. Lights and siren, I drove over to a bar where the shooting took place. Upon arrival, I found that someone had fired rifle rounds into a bar from the parking lot, or from across the street.
I went into a bar and found that a middle aged man had taken a bullet to the base of his skull, just above his neck. Despite the years of first responder training that I had, this was beyond my ken. EMT's arrived a minute later and the first thing that they did was put "trauma trousers" on the man. Suddenly, there were screams and wood chips flying through the air. The sons of bitches were shooting into the bar, again.
I ran outside and there was a piece of shit Buick, filled with teenage males, just outside the parking lot. At this point I was more angry than I ever had been in my life. The Buick peeled out and took off. I jumped into my patrol car and gave pursuit, but by the time I got out on the road, the POS was a half mile ahead of me. The POS briefly stopped and two teen males ran from the car. The POS peeled out again and I saw a huge dust cloud fly out from under the car (the rear tires had blown out).
A quarter mile from where the POS peeled out, I took a hard corner and saw the POS at a dead stop and the teens bailing out. I jumped from my patrol car, unintentionally fired a round and screamed "FREEZE!!" The four teens stopped in their tracks and put up their hands. Holding them at gun point, I called the fat slug, told him that I had the gang at gun point and that I needed back up. It took him fifteen minutes to get to the location (NOTE: It took 15 minutes for the fat slug to get to the police station once he left his home for his regular shifts. Hint hint).
Once we had the four teens cuffed, we found two handguns and a rifle in the car. Making note of that, I sped off for the spot where the POS had briefly stopped. Upon arrival, I found an officer from another shift parked outside the trailer. I also found out that the dispatcher called in the entire PD. While I found that out, a state police car pulled up. There was a mobile home at the location. The officer from my department told me that he had been flagged down and told that two teen males had been seen running into the mobile home.
"Okay" I said. "let's go get them."
"I'm not going in there" he said.
"I'll go in there with you" the state police officer said.
The two boys were found hiding in a closet.
I took the two boys to the booking room, where their four fellow gang members were already chained to the wall. After dropping them off, I went to a house across the street from the shot up bar (it should be noted that the bar had a parking lot measuring 100 yards by 50 yards). The house was used occasionally by the gang. The chief, assistant chief and a newly hired assistant detective prowled the house. A hunting rifle was propped up in a corner. That rifle, along with the weapons in the car, would be sent to the state lab to determine the actual weapon used in the shooting of the man in the bar (who died hours after being shot). The six boys were booked for murder once the hospital called us to update us on the man's condition.
The arrest of the gang on murder charges was big news in the village (although the local media gave few details). The six boys were arraigned by a district court judge, who wanted to meet me after the arraignment. The judge was quite pleased and told me that if I ever needed an arrest or search warrant signed, to give his office a call. I was very pleased to hear that.
The grand jury was convened a month after the shooting. The DA presumed that I would be nervous testifying in front of the grand jury ( I wasn't. I had met Grand Juries on multiple instances while in a college internship). He told me just to look at him when he asked questions. I led him through the entire situation, from the girl entering the police station to arresting the boys in the trailer to the rifle found in the gang house. When I finally looked at the jury, I saw that each and every one were slack jawed. What was a shock, to me, was that the former police chief (replaced by Nick) was on the grand jury.
With the gang now in jail, awaiting trial, burglaries stopped in the village and I turned my focus to traffic enforcement. I had already worked traffic really hard, but with my new focus on traffic, the unexpected popped up. I pulled over a pickup truck. After obtaining the driver's license and writing the traffic citation, I awaited the return (our cars were still years from having the mobile computer database present police cars have). The return usually took two minutes, but after four minutes, I became spooked and went to stand behind my car. At six minutes, Max pulled up behind my car and called "10-97." At this point, the dispatcher read off to me that the driver had a murder warrant out of California. At this point, the driver got out of the truck with his hands up. Max and I went to weapons drawn, in case this was an ambush. The driver told us that his female companion had no clue about his warrant and since the truck was hers, not to tow it. We still cuffed his companion (after placing him in my patrol car) and searched the pickup. Nothing incriminating was found. The woman was allowed to go on her way and the man was booked into county jail, awaiting extradition.
I never won any triathlons and never came close, but the point was to be able to finish, as a miles long bike ride, followed by a 400 yard swim, followed by a mini marathon will wear one out. My triathlon training came in handy on multiple occasions in the PD, but one situation really stands out.
I was called to the middle school across the street from the PD because of trespassers. Upon arrival, the principal escorted me to the schoolyard where the two boys (who looked to be about 14) lurked. As I entered the schoolyard, the two boys took off running and scaled the fence at the back of the schoolyard. At this point, the two boys split up and I kept a laser focus on one.
My runner entered a school bus parking lot, then ran out the other side. The boy then ran into the fire station, out the other side, into and through City Hall, exiting the other side, crossed a street and ran though a small strip mall parking lot, crossed another street, then entered the spacious parking lot where we landed the helicopters on the medical call. Crossed another street, past a row of houses, across another street, then through the open front door of someone's house (they must have been airing out the "shotgun house") and exited the back door. The boy then ran towards a wooded area adjacent to the river that split the village east and west sides. I was getting weary of the run as I'm lugging 36 pounds (gun belt + vest) and my patience had worn away. I fired a single warning shot in the air and the boy dropped to the ground. I caught up to him and cuffed him. About the time I got him to the front yard of that house, several police cars pulled up. The thoroughly amused police chief said "We just followed the trail of people that were pointing."
There were four of the cops (including the two slugs) who were truly pissed that I arrested the entire gang (I found out, a year after leaving the PD, that the four had been under the surveillance of the FBI for fencing stolen goods-probably taken by the gang members). The four of them picked at me for any tiny or perceived slight. Before the arrest, they had pretty much had been silent towards me, but were now quite vocal. In addition, a young woman that worked in the Chevron station, who had to endure the two slugs on a daily basis, became my "confidential informant" as she recited, to me, conversations that the two had. And it was through her, that I finally got a good address on the ex-wife stalking the bail bondsman, as well as the car she drove (leased by her father). After talking to her, I went to the police station, printed out affidavits for search and arrest warrants, as well as, the warrants themselves. I then took the warrants to the district judge and had them signed. Max, John and I went to the mobile home, tucked in behind a convenience store, to serve the warrants. While Max and John watched the rear of the trailer, I knocked on the front door. The woman ran out the rear door and actually was tackled by John. In her subsequent arraignment she wasn't given bond, based on her past behavior.
The PD had a lieutenant, third in command. He worked the 7 PM to 3 AM shift, mainly to supervise the two shifts (even though each shift had a supervisor). Earl tried to play things right down the middle, whereas the chief and I were always at odds because he wanted every arrest to be ROR-released on recognizance and there was a few (Max, John and I) trying to make a difference, Earl tried to split the difference, so, I was shocked when Earl called me one evening.
There was a man living in the village. He had been the Captain of a Sheriff's department two counties over, but there was a lot of illegal shit going on there and he had turned "states evidence." The man had a state police protection detail on him 7/24, so I found it suspicious when Earl asked me to watch the back of the man's house (actually, it was rented by the state) because of recent threats. Even more red flags went up when I met Earl at the location he told me to go to.
The location was an alley behind a row of houses. To my right would be the houses. To my left would be a steep hillside filled with tumbleweeds, ranging in size from medium beach ball size to jumbo beach ball size. At the crest of the hill was a row of houses facing a street, but there was a vacancy, the one facing me. Earl told me that he wanted me to stay in my patrol car, no matter what, but once he was gone, I got out of the car. There was a sniper rifle in the trunk. I got the rifle out, closed the trunk and went hunting.
I charged up the hillside. As I neared the crest, a man jumped up from behind one of the tumbleweeds. He was a hundred feet away and running away from me. I couldn't shoot him in the back-that would be murder, and he was a moving target (too hard to shoot anyway). Now, if he turned to face me, that would be a different story. He turned a corner next to a property and raced the fifty feet to the street, where a car was waiting for him. I saw the car as it entered the traffic lane and sped away. I couldn't shoot at the car as it was a winding street and the background beyond the car was a large house. If the bullet was a direct hit (and most likely it wouldn't be) there was still a good chance of it hitting the large house.
I trudged back down to my patrol car and put the rifle back in the trunk. I then stood outside the car, my head swiveling around for any threat. About ten minutes later, Earl returned. He had a very amused look on his face and the first words out of his mouth were: "You're still alive!!"
"No shit." I replied, "you missed."
"Alright" Earl said, "you can go."
The next morning, I was in a travel agent's office. It had been 2 1/2 years since my last vacation and I aimed to make it a vacation to remember. I spent two hours in that office, making the agent earn her keep as we poured over books, looking for something truly unique. What we settled on was a week of white water rafting followed by a five days of bike racing (Sacramento to San Francisco), with fifty mile legs each day.
The two trials, the bondsman's ex-wife and the murder trial, would be on the same day. I planned the white water rafting trip to be 3 days after the two trials and I would have more than enough time to reach Northern California to go rafting. In the end, the 6 teens worked a plea bargain for 3 years (which doesn't sound like much time for murder, but considering prison conditions, it would truly be hard time). The bondsman's ex-wife's trial lasted ninety minutes and she got five years. I wrapped up at the courthouse at noon, headed for the police station, submitted my overtime slip and gave my two week notice.
The white water rafting trip was the unexpected, but in a good way. The first day, I rafted with a couple and a guide down the river. The next four days, I was in guide school with the bonus being that I didn't have to solve the challenges given to the guides on a daily basis-all I had to do was ride on the rafts.
The bike race was trouble free up until the end. I was running third, five miles from the finish line, when some lunkhead pulled out of his driveway without looking. At the time, I was going downhill, moving about thirty miles an hour. I hit the car, then went tea kettle over ass, flying into a roadside ditch, where my body skidded for a bit before stopping. I heard my helmet going "skruuuuuuuunch!!" on the concrete. It had been cold that morning, so I was wearing three layers of clothing and that saved me from road rash. My bike was mangled. The guy, whose car I hit, fled the scene. A witness let me borrow their cellphone and I called the race organizers. They said that they would send someone out.
An hour later, a car skidded to a stop in front of me. It was an acquaintance from the military. He was blown away that I was in San Francisco. He gave me a ride to the finish line. I had a small lunch, checked into a hotel, had a large dinner, then called my mom. She told me that my stepfather was dying of cancer (I knew that) and his daughter, was grieving and roaming the house in a drunken stupor and in her underwear, So I would need to bunk out somewhere for 3 or 4 days. I called an ex-girlfriend in Colorado. She put me up for four days and it was a good visit.
I got home to find that the PD had collected my take home unit from my parent's house. The next day I went to the PD and turned in everything. It felt good.