This week included lots of traffic stops and property crime reports. That can only mean one thing, I am training again.
I started training D Monday night. He is 32, married, and a former drummer and pharmacy technician. He is in phase two of the training program. That means he has completed three weeks of training on day shift. I have not trained in a while, let alone a phase two rookie that knows very little. I am sure it will take me a few days to get back into the swing of training.
After I gave him the day one in my patrol car speech which covers driving very slowly and smoothly along with do what I tell you to do (I say it nicely), we made our first traffic stop. The vehicle made the illegal left turn, D activated the lights, and he pulled over into a gas station parking lot. After D made his initial contact with the driver, I got the driver out of the vehicle. There was a very strong alcoholic beverage odor coming from the vehicle and I wanted to see if it was coming from the driver or the passenger. It turned out to be coming from both of them. I called for a task force unit to come and test the driver. I was certain that he was too intoxicated to drive. It took the task force unit about 30 minutes to arrive. He put the driver through all of the tests and he passed. I was shocked. This was only the second time (out of at least 100 times) that I have called for a task force unit and the driver had not been arrested. So, D wrote him a ticket, he signed it, and was free to leave. It was his lucky night.
A few hours later we volunteered for a report call in the other district. The home owner, Y, told us that the suspect, V, was a person that he has known for at least 20 years. They went to high school together. Y is a contractor and V is a homeless alcoholic. Y, out of the kindness of his heart I guess, decided to give V a job and moved him into his home. Things went well for a couple of weeks, and then V started not showing up for work. I am not sure how that happens when you live with your boss, but that is what we were told. Y said that morning when he went to the garage to get his tools to load them for the day, one of his cordless drills was missing. He immediately suspected V and went to his room. V was not there. Y called him and V said that Y owed him some money and that is why he took the drill. Apparently V was not yet ready to be a contributing member of society.
I was off on Tuesday night. I had a golf tournament to play in Wednesday morning. Since I am the talent (just kidding) so to speak, I thought that I would get a good night's sleep before the event. It was a four man scrabble to raise money for the men's ministry at my church. I played with my Dad, cousin, and great friend T. We have played in a few of these types of tournaments over the past two years, but this was the first one where we actually played up to our potential. We won the event by a few strokes and then won 2 door prizes during the awards presentation. Finally.
Wednesday night started with another theft call. The home owner told us that on occasion his garage door malfunctions. It starts going down, gets about half way, and then goes back up. Apparently that happened last night. He came out to leave for work and noticed that both of his vehicles had been rummaged through. He described the missing items to us in minute detail (he had all day to make a list). I then asked him if the door from his attached garage to his house had been locked last night, and he said no. I do not think that he had thought about that fact. It was unfortunate that things had been taken, but it could have been much worse.
Then we were dispatched to an auto theft. From the address, I suspected that the vehicle had been towed, and not stolen. As we arrived, there was a tow truck towing a vehicle from the parking lot. I pointed that out to D, and then I showed him the sign by the parking lot waring that your vehicle will be towed if you park here and leave the premise. Sure enough, this couple had parked here and then gone across the street to a club. When they came out, only about twenty minutes after arriving, their vehicle was gone. The tow companies have spotters that watch the lots. As soon as you leave the premise, they call in the tow trucks. We showed the couple the tow away sign and then gave them the phone number to the tow line. It was an expensive lesson to learn.
Then we made a routine traffic stop and had covered all of the training categories for the night. wW had just settled into our report writing spot, when we were dispatched to an assault in progress. Numerous other units decided to check by and we arrived after most of them. The people involved were intoxicated and not very open with information. So, after the female complainant stated that she wished we would all leave, my Sergeant told all of us to do just that. We returned to our spot and started writing. About 15 minutes later, another call dropped at the same address. We returned and no one would come out to talk to us. We left again, and sure enough, 15 minutes later another call at the same address. This time we were able to get some cooperation. The female that lived in the apartment had a birthday party that night. It was her and three other males that all work together at a downtown restaurant. They were all drinking and all of the males were trying to win the affection of the female. She made her choice, and asked the other males to leave. They did not go willingly. Fights took place, bottles were thrown, and a knife even made an appearance. The district attorney that I spoke with did not want to accept charges on anyone at that time. We made sure that everyone had a safe place to stay for the evening, far away from each other, and then wrote the report.
When I arrived at roll call Thursday night, the desk Sergeant advised me that we would be running a search warrant with a narcotics squad at the beginning of the shift. That is not my favorite thing to do, but it would be good experience for D. We sat in on the planning meeting and were told our area of responsibility. We were tasked to secure the parking lot of the club and to take anyone in the lot into custody while the squad hit the front doors. We all loaded up and drove to the location. We all descended on the place at the same time and the take down went very smoothly.
After everything was sorted out, we were asked to transport the two females that had been arrested. They both were being charged with possession of a controlled substance. One of them liked to be the center of attention. She cried all the way to jail. She told us that her occupation was "bikini dancer". She got the dancer part correct, but I do not think bikinis are involved, at least not for very long. She had an envelope in her purse with about 300 one dollar bills stuffed inside. She kept trying to tell us that it was not her cocaine, even though it was in her purse. That will all be sorted out later.
Later in the shift we volunteered for a criminal mischief report. The "man" that answered the door told us that his ex-boyfriend came over and broke his window. Apparently their 8 month relationship had recently ended. However, over the Halloween weekend, the ex saw our "man" at one of the clubs in the gayborhood with a new squeeze. This did not sit well with the ex and he decided to get some revenge by breaking a window and then slashing two tires on "man's" car. Men tend to be jealous creatures and when they date each other, it can get interesting.
On Friday night we were the print unit. We made three traffic stops at the beginning of the shift. One of the drivers was dumb enough to throw his cigarette butt out his window and onto the pavement while we were writing his ticket. He made it very easy for us to add the littering violation to his ticket. Then we were asked to check for prints on a vehicle that had been burglarized. The owner had left his laptop in plain view in the backseat of the vehicle. When will people learn to take their valuables out of their vehicles?
Later in the shift things went a little crazy with burglaries. First up was a private pharmacy. Inside the pharmacy has a room where the drugs are kept. Customers come up to a window set into the wall of that room to get their prescriptions filled. The window is 3 inches thick bullet proof glass. The suspects used a large rock to shatter the front door. They then hit the bullet proof window with the same rock. The glass did not break, but the entire window, frame and all, came out of the wall and fell into the small room. The suspect jumped through the opening and took the drugs that he was after. I was able to lift a few prints from that scene. The entire event was on video, so I knew exactly where and what he had touched.
About thirty minutes later, a coffee shop was burglarized. Ten minutes after that, a Blockbuster. At the coffee shop the suspects were after the tip jar. At Blockbuster, the flat screen TVs were the target. Two TVs were damaged, but they were not smart enough to realize that you just have to lift the TV off of the wall mount. They tried to just pull them off, and that does not work very well.
I am glad to be training again. D is doing well and is picks things up quickly. That makes my job MUCH easier. That concludes another week on patrol.
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