This week I rode with B twice, was the print unit even though I was not officially, and participated in an awesome in-service class.
B and I rode together on Monday night. We were the print unit because the regular officer was off that night. It was a very slow night. Not a single print or picture call dropped, but we did check by with a few officers on their calls. Since October is my birth month, I needed to qualify with my pistol. Monday night was so slow, it seemed like a good night to drive out to the outdoor pistol range which is up by the big airport. It was such a slow night in our area that 6 other officers went with us to practice their shooting. I qualified, but did not shoot as well as I would have liked. It was the first time that I had shot since last October. I wrote last year that I wanted to shoot more over the coming year, but that did not happen. Hopefully, this will be the year that I am able to practice a little bit more.
Tuesday night B and I rode together again. We rode my regular patrol numbers. Early in the shift we were dispatched to a male and female disturbance in the ward. We arrived and found our Sergeant already talking to the female. So we listened to what she had to say. The female who is 20 years old, told us that he ex-boyfriend who is 34 years old came over to her apartment looking for his cell phone. The conversation quickly turned heated, and the male ended up pushing her and then hit her in the face. Ok, so we have a good assault / family violence incident. The Sergeant decided to gather the information and do the report (I offered to do it, but she insisted). When the Sergeant asked the female to describe her ex-boyfriend for the report, the female looked at B. She said he was about B’s height and B’s weight. She said that he was dark skinned and then she changed it to light skinned. She did not know his date of birth or where he lived. She did not want us to find him. She was neither scared nor worried, just apathetic. So, why did she call us? I am not condoning his actions. If he hit her, he needs to go to jail. But if she does not care and is not going to help us catch him, why waste our time?
Right after roll call, we are required to “spark test” our tasers. This involves removing the dart cartridge from the taser, turing it on, and holding down the trigger for one second and then turning it off. This is done to make sure that the taser is working properly and will fire when you need it to fire. When I did my spark test on Tuesday, the taser did not fire properly. Usually this is caused by a battery issue. The desk Sergeant put a new battery in it and it still did not work. So, I needed a new taser. New tasers are acquired from the personnel at the outdoor pistol range. So, we headed out to the pistol range for the second night in a row. Since we were going out there, we figured that we might as well shoot again. So, already, I am doing better than last year. I shot a little better than the night before and got a new taser. Heck of a deal.
Towards the end of the shift we were dispatched to a person down. When we arrived the person down was actually in the back of a cab. B opened up the back door of the cab and started talking to the male. I shined my flashlight on his head and observed a bump on his forehead. It was about the size of a baseball. The male looked like he had a creature living in his head which was trying to get out. About that time an ambulance arrived and the paramedics got the male out of the cab. They started to ask him a few questions to check his mental state. They asked him where he was (location) and he responded with “I am right here.” This was repeated about three times. The paramedics looked like they wanted to slap him. Then they asked him what year it was and his answer was “October.” Again this was repeated a few times. After the paramedics were convinced that he was really out of it and not being sarcastic, they decided to load him up and transport him to the hospital.
I was by myself Wednesday night. The print unit was off, but the desk Sergeant said that we were too short handed for me to ride as the print unit. So, of course, the first call that I am dispatched to is a print call. Evening shift officers went out to a house that had been burglarized. Instead of calling for the evening shift print unit or even using the print kit that every patrol officer has been issued, they decided to wait until the end of their shift to drop a print call for the location. As soon as I arrived at the print call, I knew it was going to be a long one. The homeowner had numerous items out in the living room which he said had been moved by the burglar. Then he started asking about various surfaces and methods for lifting fingerprints. Outstanding, another person that has watched a little too much CSI. I explained to him the tools that I had been given for the job and what surfaces were conducive for me to left prints from. I ended up dusting quite a few items, but only came up with smudges.
A short time later, my Sergeant called me and asked if I would come to his location and print another scene. This time it was at a laundry mat that has been burglarized. They had video of the incident so I was able to see exactly where and what the suspect touched. He put his bare palm down on a folding table. So, I got out my stuff and lifted the palm print. Amazingly, it looked pretty good. I dusted a few other areas where the suspect had touched, but nothing compared to the palm. Those were the only two calls for the night and they were both print calls even though I was not the print unit. Strange.
I was off on Thursday night. I was scheduled to take a tactical shotgun class on Friday, and I wanted to be well rested before the class, for my safety as well as my classmates.
Friday morning I drove out to the county firearms complex. The county has a nice covered pistol range, two outdoor pistol/shotgun ranges, and a rifle range. There were 8 of us in the class and we met in a classroom inside the range house. Once inside, we were met by a county range officer. His responsibility was to show us a safety video. He took the opportunity to practice his stand-up comedy routine, and was actually rather entertaining. In the middle of the video, a county officer that was looking for something, maybe, opened the door to our class and verbalized. I say verbalized because no one in the room understood anything that came out of his mouth. I think he was mumbling cajun with a heavy, heavy, heavy southern accent. If you have seen the movie “The Waterboy”, think of the “Farmer Fran” character that was constantly mumbling something incoherent, multiplied by 10. He was completely unintelligible.
After the safety meeting it was time to get our get shotguns and head out to the range. The rest of the class was spent learning proper shooting techniques, speed shooting techniques, and tactical skills. We each shot about 200 rounds of free-to-us ammunition. Free ammunition makes any day a good day. The next time I go bird hunting, the birds should be very nervous.
That concludes another week on patrol.
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