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Calling all LEO'S. Stories please.


Whiskey Business

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I grew up watching the dukes of hazard, where they jump cars and the police do the same.

 

One night I had a prowler call, so I headed that way.  I had to go down a dip with the railroad track a bump in the dip with another dip on the other side of the track.  That dip quickly ramped up to the intersection of a 3 lane highway and traffic light.  

 

I could see the light changing to yellow as I approached the train track .  I gunned the engine to try and beat the light.  I hit the bump for the train track, cleared the dip on the other side.   With lights blazing away, I continued to floor the gas pedal.  The ramp to the highway became just that,  a ramp.  

 

The 3 lane highway slopped at an angle downward as you crossed them.  My car bounced off the ramp, cleared all three lanes.  My car hit the other side fairly hard as an inch deep gash was cut into the pavement.   A witness told my chief I hit the red light hanging above,  but I doubt that.   

 

Not only did I not find the prowler, but I then noticed gas leaking from a busted fuel line. 

 

Later we discovered that the oil pan had been bent and needed a new oil pan, and also scuff marks in the wheel well.  

 

I was put on foot patrol for a while.   

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We got the report that a known thief was siphoning gas.

We wanted this scoundrel, he'd put a cement block through the door of the local grade school during 4th of July fireworks and made off with a computer.

We jumped in the cruiser, pulled the shifter into "S" for "Sneak" and went whistling up the street, stopped a block shy, got out, closed the doors quietly and headed across back yards, intent on an intercept and takedown.
We had a newbie with us, a good enough kid I'll call Bill.

I was walking in the grass and was making all the sound of a passing cloud, and poor old Bill was bumbling up the middle of the alley, right in the gravel crown in the middle, with all the stealth of a Jersey cow.

I was about to direct him to a quieter path when my foot came down on something that wasn't grass.

I looked down.

I was standing in a neatly circumscribed, bare dirt semicircle.

At the center of the affected radius was a dogbox, and in the dogbox, on the end of the chain, was a Doberman.

The Doberman was target locked on me, his ears laid back and his lips peeled back to show those lovely long ivories, and I heard that deep, menacing snarl that precedes general unpleasantness, so I did what I figured was appropriate in the circumstance.

I put my finger to my lips and said "Shhhh."

The Doberman's ears came up, his head came up, he shhh'd and I heard his tail smacking the inside of his dogbox (to this day Bill thinks I am second cousin to St Francis of Assisi!)

We went on around the next house and I heard the Marshal declare in command voice, "Sir, I am the town marshal, PUT THE GUN DOWN!"

Perhaps I should mention ... I was off duty when this all started ... I was wearing a red and white fine check hand made square dancin' shirt, blue jeans and polished Wellingtons, I wore my cowboy hat and my single action Ruger in a tied down fast draw rig, and I'd shoved half my wallet behind my belt so the badge half hung down to be seen beside the belt buckle.

I drew and swung around the corner of the house.

An old residenter was standing on his back porch, peering into the darkness through Coke bottle glasses, a Beretta .32 in hand: the Marshal had a cautioning hand up:  "Sir, I am the town marshal, put the gun down," and when he got close enough for the old fellow to see him, he lowered the pistol.

Turns out he'd been asleep in his back room couch when the gasoline thief came in through an unlocked door.

The old timer woke up, raised his pistol and the thief departed with alacrity.

The Marshal relieved the old timer of his pistol and he didn't understand the heel release, he slid the magazine floor plate instead of pushing the heel release:  floor plate, spring, follower and loaded rounds hit the floor:  he looked up, handed me the pistol and said "Captain Keller is our automatic weapons specialist, he'll take care of this," and I did.

 

One month later, after prolonged rain, we had the expected flooding; we set out saw horses and ROAD CLOSED signs, and we waited.

There was a beer joint down the road and somehow, somehow a drunk got through the rising Hocking River flood and allowed as he was going to get home fast before the waters got any deeper, he came around the curve, floored it, screamed past the end of the reflectorized, flashing-lights-on-it sawhorse, nearly clipped the Marshal, and blasted into the floodwaters at an estimated forty miles per hour.

The Marshal borrowed my thigh-high fire boots, waded out into the filthy floodwaters, brought the suddenly sobered miscreant back in irons, and glared at me.

"Captain," he said, "your right boot leaks."

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At times Manuel Andres and myself would ride as a 2 man crew. Both of us had 25 years in. So, when we rode together and got in service I would just get on the radio and tell the dispatcher the geriatric car was in service. Poor female dispatcher couldn't talk for 15 minutes or more.

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Woman called the Police Department office phone one afternoon at shift change.  She said a crazy driver had chased her for over five miles, trying to run her off the road.  As I was trying to get a description and direction of travel, she said she would be pulling into our parking lot in less than a minute.  I walked to the front door, and saw two cars come sliding into the lot.  A woman jumped out of the first car, pointing at the second one, and screaming.  

 

Turns out he was drunk, and took exception to her lane changing and decided to follow her and give her a piece of his mind.  Instead, he got a trip to the crossbar hotel for the night.

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Was the passenger officer in a chase.  A pair of desperadoes had been raising hell in a very quiet neighborhood on their mini bikes.  The chase was on.  One police car two minibikes.  The minibikes split and my partner wisely decided to go after the minibike that was smoking.  After a couple more blocks, the kid dumped the bike.  I bailed out of the car and the foot chase was on.  The kid was able to keep just about one city backyard width ahead of me.  We were going over fences for a couple of minutes.  I noticed that the kid was approaching a pile of firewood in front of a vertical wooden fence at the next yard.  The kid used the pile of firewood as a springboard and took off over the fence.  As he went over the fence, I heard him scream ahhhhhh f*********k.  Being the trained investigator that I was, I slowed up figuring there was probably a big dog or some other such hazard on the other side.  As I got to the top of the pile of firewood, I looked down.  And down some more.  Seems the yard the young man jumped into was about 10 feet lower (not including the fence) than the yard I was standing in.  The culprit was laying spread eagled face down in the sod.  I cuffed him up and walked back to the patrol car.  When I got there, my partner asked if I was missing any equipment.  Seems when I bailed out of the car, the seat belt had wrapped around the grip of my S & W Model 19 and ripped it right out of the holster.  Fortunately, a good citizen had used himself as a barricade to keep others away from the gun until my partner got back to the car.  

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17 hours ago, Sarge said:

Was the passenger officer in a chase.  A pair of desperadoes had been raising hell in a very quiet neighborhood on their mini bikes.  The chase was on.  One police car two minibikes.  The minibikes split and my partner wisely decided to go after the minibike that was smoking.  After a couple more blocks, the kid dumped the bike.  I bailed out of the car and the foot chase was on.  The kid was able to keep just about one city backyard width ahead of me.  We were going over fences for a couple of minutes.  I noticed that the kid was approaching a pile of firewood in front of a vertical wooden fence at the next yard.  The kid used the pile of firewood as a springboard and took off over the fence.  As he went over the fence, I heard him scream ahhhhhh f*********k.  Being the trained investigator that I was, I slowed up figuring there was probably a big dog or some other such hazard on the other side.  As I got to the top of the pile of firewood, I looked down.  And down some more.  Seems the yard the young man jumped into was about 10 feet lower (not including the fence) than the yard I was standing in.  The culprit was laying spread eagled face down in the sod.  I cuffed him up and walked back to the patrol car.  When I got there, my partner asked if I was missing any equipment.  Seems when I bailed out of the car, the seat belt had wrapped around the grip of my S & W Model 19 and ripped it right out of the holster.  Fortunately, a good citizen had used himself as a barricade to keep others away from the gun until my partner got back to the car.  

 

Similar whoops.  I jumped out of my car to chase some miscreant or other (I think he robbed a kid who had been riding a bike).  I grabbed my nightstick in one hand and my handset (radio) in the other as I started the chase.  Then I noticed something heavy flopping against my leg.  Well, at that time we carried revolvers in old "suicide flap" holsters.  Think closed top, snap down, cavalry type holster.  Mine had come loose and was about to fall off my belt with the revolver still inside.  I managed to grab the holster, with my revolver still inside, as I continued the chase.  So there I am trying to keep hold of my nightstick and radio and holstered pistol while chasing this clown and trying to keep dispatch updated on my location.  I kept thinking to myself WTH is wrong with you?  You've got to look ridiculous.   Stupid freakin' holster.   I did manage to catch the guy, but I don't recall how I managed to juggle the nightstick, radio, holstered pistol AND my handcuffs when I did.

 

I also remember thinking that if Capt. X happened to roll by he was going to ask me why I wasn't wearing my hat.  (He didn't.  It was still in my car.)

 

Ahhh, good times.  :D

 

Angus

 

p.s.  Sarge, we also had a couple guys that got out of their cars, not in any hurry, and had their pistols fall out of those idiot holsters.  Luckily we got rid of those stupid things a couple years later.

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2 hours ago, Black Angus McPherson said:

 

 

 

p.s.  Sarge, we also had a couple guys that got out of their cars, not in any hurry, and had their pistols fall out of those idiot holsters.  Luckily we got rid of those stupid things a couple years later.

At the time, we had just switched from the flap holsters to a border patrol style holster.  Don't remember the brand.  This was in the days when you could double the seatbelt over so it just acted as a lap belt and didn't chafe your neck all shift.  The belt tangled on the grip of the gun as I exited the patrol vehicle.  Ripped the entire seam out of the front of the holster.  Do you remember the suicide straps that went with the cross draw flap holsters?

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My first Chief of Police was so proud when he got a velcro belt setup.  Until he got out on a call, and peeled the whole belt off getting out of the car.  

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Council President hated anyone in uniform.

Us, the State Patrol, Sheriff's deputies, US Postal Service, Girl Scouts, didn't matter ... if they were in uniform, he hated 'em.

His wife was as sweet as he wasn't, she drove school bus.

His son was a thief, pure and simple, we had him dead to rights on stealing a four wheeler, all we needed do was take the paper work down to the prosecutor and file on the scoundrel.

Well, the town Marshal screwed up and was fired, so I jumped in the truck and headed for Village Hall with intent to take the papers down to the prosecutor.

Upon arrival at village hall, Council President was stomping smoking paper ash into the grass in the side yard.

He beat us to the file cabinet.

That was the year I was graduated from nursing school: my first job was a local nursing home.
One year later I was assigned to North Wing, midnight shift.

Lo and behold.

Council President was a resident -- he wasn't all that old, but he'd had a stroke and he could neither move nor speak, though his mind was intact.

I went in, in nursing whites, I pulled out my wallet and badged him, formally introduced myself as both a lawman and as his assigned nurse.

When I ID'd myself as one of the lawmen he'd taken pains to calumniate, I saw fear in his eyes.

That night, I treated him like gold.

I was nothing but kind, I was absolutely considerate, I went out of my way to make sure he was taken care of and comfortable, or as best I could with him unable to communicate.

I hurt him more by being kind, than if I'd rolled up a towel and worked him over.

 

I mention this particular fellow because when the town Marshal said we needed tires on the cruiser, Council President beat fist on table and absolutely not.

The Marshal and I walked out.

We drove up to another village, pulled over in front of the restaurant, met with that village's police chief.

In the course of conversation and chicken fingers, we asked the fellow who was the inspiration for the Firelands town marshal, JW Barrents: we asked if a motor vehicle was mandated to have safe tread on the tires?
Yes.

If a vehicle is found with nearly bald tires, it would have to be impounded, would it not?
Oh, yes.

If you go outside and take a look at that white Dodge, never mind the lights on the roof and ignore the decals on the door.

He looked at us and asked if we were sure.

Our Marshal smiled a wicked smile and said yes.

Then he called the Council President.

Sir: You are going to authorize four new tires, mounted and balanced, tonight.

I was four feet from the Marshal and I could hear the explosion coming out of the phone.

Never saw my Marshal grin quit so broad ...

He said the Council President would authorize the expenditure, tonight, or his next call would be to that muck raking channel 10 reporter out of Columbus, and the Council President's name would be prominent in the Muck Raking News the next night.

We got our tires.

Come to think of it, that was the night he had his stroke!

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Well. I see I ain't the only one to do the Duke's Of Hazzard roadway jump contest with a patrol car LOL. Mine was a 1977 Ford Maverick. Freshly repainted, new engine, suspension, the works. Going too fast, not paying attention and I paid for it. $820.43 if memory serves. See, in the Army, most they can take from an enlisted man is a month''s pay. 77 Ford or million dollar tank, all they get is a month LOL. (Officers now hehehe, they got to pay the full ride. You gonna stay in until you're ninety to pay it off LOL)

 

Then there was the case of the runaway car.

Went to a call to assist Fire with a medical call. Which turned into a knock down drag out. So I was in a tad bit of a hurry when I parked my squad in front of the house. In a circular driveway. (which actually came in handy)

 

When I came out...no car. Since it was one of those big custom houses in the "country" I figured I just came out the wrong door until these kids sitting on the porch informed me that my "partner" was driving it across the street. Problem was, I didn't HAVE a partner! Do you know how hard it is to run along a moving car at idle speed, get the spare key off your belt, open the door and get a leg in there to mash the brake (No. Do not flip the shift into park. That screws up the tranny. I learned this on a previous incident not of the same kind LOL) I also lost every bit of equipment on my belt that didn't have a flap or a snap. Hadda use my zippo to find my radio, speedloaders, mace, nightstick, flashlight. Yes I managed to stop the car before it ran into a ditch and the "new" Arizona Pinstriping was nicely repaired by a wax N wash.

 

The Case of PCP Dude and the Pinto.

So once upon a time, I served in an MP unit that was once known, in a previous war, as The Red Ball Express. (D-Day related, look it up. Cool story) That unit in the 1970's provided patrol services to the greater Nuernberg Metropolitan Area. Nuernberg, Federal Republic of Germany AKA West Germany. My partner and I had arrested (actually the correct military term at that time was "apprehended" a fellow who was high on pcp (again) and tearing up a local bar. Said GI was subdued and placed into our "patrol car" a Ford Pinto. (Hey now, at the time, our command considered these a step up from the M151A1 Jeeps we'd been driving LOL)

 

Almost to the MP station, said aprehendee un-subdued himself (woke up) and decided he wanted to fight. During such ruckus, his feets got tangled in the steering wheel rendering it non-functioning. As we were currently "aimed" at a row of cars parked in front of the CID command, and.....not being able to get my feet securely on the brake I just slapped the gearshift into park.

 

That's how I know not to do that anymore......

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Got behind a car that was doing quite a bit of weaving in traffic one night.  Decided to pull it over to check for DUI.  Car slowly pulled into a very lit parking lot.  I activated my overhead lights, and watched the driver and passenger switch places.  This was also caught on my in car video.  I approached the person currently sitting in the driver seat, and ended up arresting her for DUI, the went back up and arrested the passenger for DUI as well.  Got convictions on both in court.  

 

In one month, I arrested the same person for DUI twice in less than 24 hours, two different people driving DUI in the same car twice in less than 4 hours,  two people out of the same car on the same stop for DUI, and the same guy 4 times for DUI.  All in 30 days.  

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Here’s a real quick one. Rookie year at Johnstown Police. Lost the gas cap to the cruiser. Didn’t want to get into any trouble so I climbed the fence at the city garage where they kept the crashed cruisers and liberated a gas cap from a wreck. 

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20 hours ago, Sarge said:

  Do you remember the suicide straps that went with the cross draw flap holsters?

 

That doesn't ring a bell.  We didn't use cross draws, tho.  Are you talking about the strap that went across the middle of the holster with a snap that "secured" the holster to the belt?  If not, I've got no clue.

 

 

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2 hours ago, Black Angus McPherson said:

 

That doesn't ring a bell.  We didn't use cross draws, tho.  Are you talking about the strap that went across the middle of the holster with a snap that "secured" the holster to the belt?  If not, I've got no clue.

 

 

No.  The Sam Browne strap that when over your shoulder and secured the front of the gunbelt to the opposite side back of the gun belt.  We called them suicide straps, because in a fight, the bad guys would grab onto 

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1 hour ago, Sarge said:

No.  The Sam Browne strap that when over your shoulder and secured the front of the gunbelt to the opposite side back of the gun belt.  We called them suicide straps, because in a fight, the bad guys would grab onto 

 

We didn't use those.  The belts came with them, but they were the first thing pitched when we were issued our gear.  I seem to recall department pictures of motorcycle cops from the '50's(?) that wore them, but I never saw anyone use them when I was there.  We went to security holsters with heavy duty belts and underbelts a few years after I started.

 

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I was working a 2 man car for the LA Sheriff’s department out of West Hollywood Station back in the early 1980’s.  We got in a foot pursuit of a residential burglary suspect over fences and through yards in a residential area.

 

I lost sight of the suspect who did not have to wear 30lbs of extra gear.  As I hit the top of fence to go over it the biggest Rottweiler I have ever seen greeted me by snapping his jaws shut in front of my face.  I literally did a back flip off of the top of the fence and landed on all fours.   I quickly got up and ran to the left and jumped over the next fence.  My partner asked me how I knew that the suspect did not go through the yard I did a back flip out of, I replied, “Because that freakin dinosaur did not have a leg sticking out of his mouth.”

 

We chased the suspect into one of the containment Deputies ensuring that the state prison system would have another happy resident for the next 3 to 5 years.  

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As a Parole Agent I had a lot more authority when dealing with parolees than most LEOs. Got a call one day from some local drug task force officers that a parolee was letting some other unlicensed pharmacologists make stuff in his place. So I went with them as I could enter the house at any time. Went in and it was feet pounding everywhere as our parolee and his three buddies tried to run. I wound up wrestling one down, two more grabbed by other LEOs and the last grabbed by an officer with 4 feet. When we got everyone arranged I realized i had lost my leather cap. Looked over and our K9 had it in his mouth! I really miss that cap...

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For all the angst you fellows have about your holster set ups, the Ottawa Police Department of the 1960's (and before ) has you beat.

The issue sidearm was  a Colt Police Positive,round butt, loaded with only 5 rounds - nothing under the pin.

It was carried under the tunic, in a built in, leather lined back pocket.

The tunic had to be worn buttoned at all times.

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Her name was Kaye.

She was a smiling, cheerful, motherly sort, and she was one of the Sheriff's dispatchers.

She always, always! looked out for "Her Boys."

She called out the cavalry on my behalf one dark night.

Wasn't my fault.

Honest.

The suspect was reported wandering a back yard, making strange sounds, and when the little old bluehair parted the curtains and took a look, the suspect's face was right there, nearly touching the glass, causing the little old lady resident to screech, drop her tea and perform the Reverse High Jump, in that order, after which she called to report a really ugly prowler.

I got there and the prowler took one look at me and decided I was more ugly than he, and the chase was on.

Ever try to catch a bull calf?

They've got full time four wheel drive and they honestly don't care what they knock over when they're on the lam ... I was still young and skinny and fleet of foot and the chase was on!

A HALF HOUR LATER ...

"huff, puff, pant ... Five, Five-twenty."

"FIVE-TWENTY DO YOU NEED BACKUP!"

"(gasp, wheeze) Suspect has been apprehended (pant, hack, gasp)

"FIVE-TWENTY, ADVISE DO YOU NEED SQUAD?"

"Negative, Five (pant, pant), suspect was a bull calf (huff, pant) and suspect is apprehended."

Long silence, then ...

"Responding units cancel 520 backup."

That night, after we hauled in a fellow who insisted he was second cousin to Joe Lewis and tried to prove it (he came out in second place), Kaye looked out, crooked her finger at me, I went into the Sacred Circle of the Dispatcher's Office and she gave me THAT LOOK and said "What happened?"

I leaned against the doorframe and grinned and admitted that if a fourteen year old girl hadn't shown up with a five gallon bucket, and that bull calf thought she had feed for him, I'd still be running after that sawed-off bovine!

Somehow I don't think that made it into the training officer's Book of Useful Tricks of the Trade!

 

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Henry T Harrison and Badlands Bob both correctly observed that some things are best unsaid.

Many of my adventures went into Firelands, with time, place and names changed to protect ... well, to protect everyone involved, guilty and innocent and uninvolved alike.

I was sorting through the things we'd done and all we'd survived, and as hard as I try to keep the hard memories behind a brick wall, they philter through cracks in the mortar and laugh at me with a deep, evil, echoing voice.

I try to recall the funny stories, the ones I can share in mixed company.

Sometimes ... sometimes they come out in odd places.

Rye Miles discussed a Smith model 19 and that brought out my reply, how my partner had a double handful of model 19 as we stood back to back one dark night at a 2 am traffic stop while we were surrounded by a hostile carload of carnies.

A young woman of my acquaintance was beaten to death by her husband, who was out on bond: he'd pulled a knife and I'd taken him in, rather than introduce him to the terminal performance of a couple of factory loaded .357s.

The county prosecutor was not happy with me over that one, he said it would have been a righteous shoot and to this day I remember his words and I remember finding what was left of his wife and it's it was my fault she's dead.

The town marshal pursued a local druggie, who rolled his van and died of a hangman's fracture: I was first medic on scene -- by virtue of being off duty from both the Marshal's office and the squad both -- I crawled my skinny carcass into that mashed up van and assessed the patient as nonviable, and then I set with the Marshal the rest of the night as he blamed himself for the death.

Wasn't his fault, Jack Doe should not have gone rabbit.

Many memories of getting a call at oh dark thirty -- "I need to talk, can you come over?" -- my reply, every time, without exception, was "I'm on my way" -- we'd set on the back step and drink coffee until the sun reached up with orange fingers and gripped the rim of the world and laboriously chinned itself behind the far hills.

I've chosen not to talk about the night my buddy tried reloading (in a firefight, think performance under stress) from speed strips instead of the speedloaders we routinely used -- he'd never tried them even in practice and he got a round under his extractor -- I tossed him my J-frame and the good guys prevailed.

My memory is his frustration, hammering fruitlessly on the ejector rod, almost in tears, "Kilroy, I'm jammed!" and seeing that blued-steel airweight Smith spinning through the air toward him... it wasn't until silence dropped like a wet shroud over the situation, not until distant approaching sirens penetrated the red ringing in our ears that we realized ... we'd won ...

... there was no feeling of victory ...

I prefer to remember the funny ones, like the same partner borrowing my shotgun and sitting on the trunk of a car while we waited for backup, because on search incident to arrest we found a pair of new, in the crate and blank firing adapters, Property of US Army, Uzi submachine guns. 

Part of that tale went into the first Firelands book, where Willamina went into the Spring Inn and stopped the barfight by virtue of a round of double-ought through the ceiling.

I did that, at a beer joint that is now fallen in and long since abandoned, and like Willamina's situation, the core of the boil was two women going at it like the Kilkenny cats.

There are hard memories that haunt me to this day.

I still sit with my back to a wall and my eyes to the door, my cousin's wife is a survivor of childhood abuse and she remarked on our shared characteristic of hypervigilance ... some things are indeed best left unsaid, and some things I will not say.

On the other hand, there's the time the Marshal went through the schoolhouse ... I'd mentioned, earlier, how a gasoline thief put a cement block through the grade school glass door to gain entry ... this was a week later.

The Marshal went in, my partner and I were at opposite corners of the building, watching for any escape, there was a BOOM and the Marshal came out a moment later, shaking his head and rubbing his ears --

"Joe, what happened?"

"NOTHING HAPPENED!"

"Joe, we heard --"

"YOU DIDN'T HEAR ANYTHING, THAT'S AN ORDER!"

I knew the janitor.

I bribed the janitor.

For a six-pack, he told me what happened.

Apparently Joe came around the corner and shot his reflection in the locker room mirror.

Oops.

He paid the janitor well to patch the bullet crater, replace the mirror and say nothing to anyone ... good thing it was summer vacation ...

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I was not yet a lawman when I thought I'd found my first dead friend.

Some stories I won't tell, others I'll edit discreetly, and one I just posted in Short Stories, with many changes to protect a man I called friend.

He was a full head taller than me, nicest guy you'd ever want to meet, I would not want to light his fuse because the quiet ones are the deep ones.

We got an officer down call and hit the saddle: upon arrival there were at least two hundred cruisers, half a thousand uniforms and not a single shotgun in sight.

Dead of winter, snow packed in the concrete steps, Marko and I still made it up the stairway with cot and tacklebox at a flat out sprint.

I left the cot and Marko at the front door, I addressed the woman I knew by name, asked where Paul was -- that's not his name, he may well be in circulation yet and on the odd chance he reads this, he'll recognize the story and appreciate not being named -- anyway, she was in tears, she couldn't talk, I asked where Paul was and she pointed upstairs with a trembling hand and I yelled "MARKO! STAY WITH HER!" -- 

My friend was a State Trooper and he was hung over the sink, he was not moving, and he looked DEAD.

"PAUL!" I yelled and SLAMMED my palm down on his shoulder.

Just like Shelly in the short stories entry, I might as well have grabbed a cold marble statue.

And then he groaned.

He was cold because he'd come out of the shower and collapsed and apparently had been there a little while, enough to cool off to that frightening degree, and he was so muscled, so toned, so BUILT, his shoulder where I grabbed was SOLID!

I realized twice in my life just how TALL that man was.

First time I realized how tall he was, we were working a wreck on I-70 near the scales.

I am not short by any means, I'm six two, but I was obliged to crank my head back as far as it would tilt to look up at the man:  "Hello, Paul!" I greeted him.

He looked DOWN at me and boomed, "HELLO, SON!" in that delightfully deep baritone.

The second time I realized just how tall the man was ... we took him downstairs on the cot ... his head hung over the head end of the cot, and with my arms stuck out as far as they would go, his feet were square flat against my chest!

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On 7/22/2021 at 2:30 PM, Sarge said:

No.  The Sam Browne strap that when over your shoulder and secured the front of the gunbelt to the opposite side back of the gun belt.  We called them suicide straps, because in a fight, the bad guys would grab onto 

The Columbus Ohio PD STILL uses that setup. Sam Brown belt WITH shoulder strap, flap holster, and a white shirt. AND eight point hat.:blink:

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Linn Keller,

 

I agree with you.  There's lots I don't talk about, even to my wife.  As much as other people not understanding it, even more so, I don't like remembering it.

 

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