The Cost of Snow and Ice

I was working third shift one winter evening on a day we have received quite a lot of snow and ice.  Many cars were experiencing difficulties making it up several hills on streets in my area of patrol.

At around 9:00 PM while I was driving along one of our four lane street that had several hills I observed two cars stuck trying to get up one of the hills People were behind each of the cars attempting to push them up the hill. I pulled my patrol car behind the stuck cars with my overhead emergency lights on in an effort to protect the people pushing from being hit from behind.

I got out of the car and helped push first the lead car then the second car. Technically we were not supposed to help push cars, something related to workers comp. Guess occasionally I was a rebel because I thought my job was to protect and serve, Just sitting on my ass in the car while I watched someone wait for and pay for a wrecker was not my idea of serving or service

After we managed to get both cars up the hill I walked back to my car, got in and buckled up; then as I was reaching for the shift handle and the emergency light switch I was struck hard from behind.  My head was thrown back causing my hat to fly off and my body lurched forward within the constraint of the seat belt/shoulder harness.

I immediately unbuckled myself and looked for my hat and observed it on the deck behind the backseat. I decided not to get it despite the cold temperatures because I wanted to check on the driver of the vehicle that struck me. As I walked briskly to the car behind mine I noticed my overhead emergency lights were still on. I did not have the opportunity to turn them off before I was struck.  The driver told me she didn’t have any experience driving in snow. She said when she realized she was getting close to the flashing red lights she tried to stop, but instead of stopping her car started sliding on the snow and ice.

Because it was an accident involving an officer we had an officer from another police department work the accident. The driver didn’t want to be transported to the hospital in an ambulance, but my supervisor and the officer working the accident insisted.  We had to “cover all our bases” because a civilian could have possibly been injured in an office-involved accident. Her car sustained minor damage to the left front quarter panel, which caused it to rub the left front tire making it non drivable.  My patrol car only had a few scratches to the rear bumper.

I thought I was okay, and not injured in any way. After about thirty minutes had passed my neck became extremely still and sore, as was my chest, both apparently from the hard impact. I went into the station and notified my supervisor that I thought I should go to the hospital and get myself checked and receive something for the stiffness and pain.

I was driven to the hospital by one of the other officers. At the emergency room while waiting to be seen by a doctor, the officer working the accident came by to obtain additional information for his report.  He had been there getting additional information from the driver. He told me the driver had never driven on snow or ice before and she had only been driving for a few weeks. She also told the officer that when she saw she was going to hit the police car she thought that to be an emergency and she pulled the emergency brake and started to slide.

The emergency room gave me some muscle relaxers and told me to wear a cervical collar and rest at home for two days and not go to work.

I contacted the department and an officer picked me up at the hospital and took me home. I left my personal vehicle in the department parking lot until a fiend could pick it up the next day.

The accident was never discussed with me. Not sure how the ambulance, hospital bills and minor damage to the cars got fixed, but it was out of my hands.

The driver discussed above was from another country that didn’t have snow and ice. If you recall in a previous post I discussed drivers involved in accidents in snow and ice that were from states that did not have those weather conditions. My thought is make part of the driving test for states which receive snow and ice have a simulator that can test the potential driver’s driving skills on snow and ice.  Fortunately, in the examples I mentioned no one was hurt, but that isn’t always the case. Is my proposal feasible? Yes, it would cost money, but can we put a price tag on human lives?

Until Tomorrow,

Sally S

Theft Of A Child's Integrity

One summer evening around 7:00 when I was working third shift I was sent to a residence concerning a theft. When I arrived at the residence I observed several men in their early twenties standing in the front yard.  It was explained to me that one of the men left his wallet sitting on the edge of the front porch of the house while they played football in the front yard. 

They said when they were finished playing and went back to the porch the wallet was no longer there.  They recalled a young boy was hanging around the yard allegedly watching them playing football and they thought it was probably he who took the wallet. They pointed  to the house where they thought the boy lived.  I walked a few houses down to where the boy supposedly lived and observed a young boy hanging out in the front yard.  I approached the boy and said we needed to talk.  I also saw what could have been the outline of a man’s wallet in the young boys pants pocket. If I recall correctly this boy was about seven years old.  I asked the boy if he had taken the wallet off the porch two houses down. He looked sheepishly at me and pulled the wallet out of his pants pocket.

I told him he needed to take the wallet back and I would go with him. I also told him he was in a lot of trouble, but we would see what the man he took the wallet from wanted to do considering the boy’s age and that he returned the wallet with nothing missing.

The man from whom the wallet was taken did not desire to press charges, thus I was going to let the boy go with a warning. I was lecturing the boy on how what he did was wrong and how much trouble he could have been in when his mother came up to the boy and me and tore into me about who was I to tell her boy he was wrong. She said she has told the boy to take from those that have since they probably had more than they needed anyway. That it was a person’s right to take things left lying around.

I told the women that it wasn’t okay to just take things that people left laying around, technically that was actually classified as a theft of lost or mislaid Property. Leaving it on the front porch of a private residence was not just lying around. I also advised her it wasn’t a good idea to encourage her son to take things, to steal things. The woman grabbed her son by the arm and walked away from me cussing me out and saying I had no right to interfere.

In recent years the chasm between the haves and the have nots seems to be widening. As individuals how should we feel about that widening? Do we have an ethical responsibility? As individuals? As a society? How do we narrow the gap between the haves and the have-nots?

Until another time,

Sally S

Shooting Up Octaves

At about 2:00 AM one fall morning I was walking down the back hall of the police department to go outside through the back door.  At the back of the building was the parking lot where we parked our police cars and our POVs (personally owned vehicle). I had been in the building to turn in some reports and use the restroom while there.

As I opened the back door I saw a car drive into the back lot right behind another car.   I started to hear shots coming from both vehicles As I ducked back in the building I spoke into my shoulder microphone my call number and there were shots being fired in the back lot.  The dispatcher started to acknowledge me with a rudimentary 10- 4, but you could hear a change in his voice, as he was half through the acknowledgement. Apparently it took him a few seconds to realize what I actually had said. He asked if I was hurt or if I knew of anyone else hurt. I told him I was fine and I didn't know about anyone else. About that time the lieutenant in the building came running down the hall toward the back door.  Guns drawn, we both opened the door slightly and peered out and observed no vehicles in the lot. They apparently had already left.  We did look in the lot and found shell casings on the ground.  

After I walked inside the dispatcher was chuckling because he said in my radio traffic he could her my voice go up an octave each time I said a shot was fired.  He said its not that I sounded scared or out of control, but my voice got extremely high.

We never found out who was shooting at whom. No one had been injured and sought medical help because we never heard word from the hospital.

Having my voice go high has been a constant problem for me throughout the years.  I must concentrate hard to keep it somewhat low. But in emergencies when time is of the essence I just speak without taking the time to concentrate.

My thoughts today are on all the violence and potential violence the past week  in the news. It has been full of homicides, homicide suicides, bomb scares etc. Worse than I ever recall. What is happening? Why this recent peak?

Duct Taped

It was early evening, still light out, in the city where I was working when I was sent to an address concerning an individual duct taped on a front porch. Apparently someone walking by noticed a person taped to a chair with his mouth taped with duct tape.

I parked in front of the address and on the front porch I observed two boys that appeared to be about 16 years old and another boy about 12 years old duct taped to a chair with his mouth covered with duct tape. As I got closer to the porch one of the older boys told me to leave, to stay off his property. He didn’t call the police and I had no business on his property.

I replied with the statement that if his property was located in my city it was my business.  I also told him it looked like the younger boy taped up needed my help. He said the boy taped up was his younger brother and his younger brother needed to be taught a lesson for something he had done. I don’t remember what the younger boy had allegedly done.

I told the older boy the tape needed to come off his younger brother for safety reasons. Being taped to the chair did not allow the younger brother to use the restroom or to obtain water to drink if needed. The tape on his mouth could interfere with his breathing and also the tape could tear the skin when removed.  I gently removed the duct tape from the younger brother’s mouth. He did flinch a little as I gently pulled off the tape. When it was removed you could see redness around his lips where the tape had been. We removed the tape holding the boy in the chair. The boy thanked me for freeing him, but he didn’t want his brother to get into trouble.

I told the boys I wanted to talk with their parents. They said they only

had a Mom and she was at work.  I took down the boys' names and left.

I completed an information report and forwarded a copy to the social service agency in that city in case they might want to contact the family.

As the saying goes, violence begets violence. Controlling behaviors beget controlling behaviors. What kind of behaviors can we predict that younger brother having? Children model behaviors, they see. That’s one of the many reasons why corporal punishment is so bad. The child learns when they do something that displeases someone, i.e. their parents hit them. They grow up thinking when someone does something that displeases them, they should hit that person.  Is that the kind of behavior parents and older siblings want to teach by modeling?

Where Is Your Partner?

I was working the night shift  (Midnight – 8:00 AM) one night in one of the cities where I worked and was sent to a possible prowler call at a private residence.   I believe it was about 1:30 AM. The reporting party thought someone might be in their basement. I parked a few houses away and cautiously walked through several neighbor’s yards. (I wanted to park a short distance away and not approach on the sidewalk in case there was a look out person that might shoot at me.)  I knocked on the front door, which was answered by a middle-aged woman.

I told her I was there in response to her call concerning a possible prowler. When I tried to walk into the house the lady said something to the effect, wasn’t I going to wait for my partner? I told her I did not have a partner that I was working alone. She couldn’t believe such a thing and if I were married what kind of man would allow his wife to work alone late at night. She said she didn’t want me to check her basement.  She further stated, if all they were going to send was a woman she would check the basement herself. I tried to talk her into letting me check the basement, that if there was someone down there it could be dangerous. She still refused. I left and went back into service.

Admittedly, this was about thirty years ago, hopefully attitudes have changed.  I hadn’t had an experience that blatant in the more recent years, but I still detected an underlying sense that people preferred a male officer and male officers made them feel safer.

Why do you think people feel male officers are more competent?  I haven’t checked the statistics recently, but for some of my college work I did research on the differences between male and female police officers and statistically women officers were not assaulted and injured more than male officers.  How do you feel about female police officers? What do you think female officers should do to instill more confidence in them with the public?

Until next time,

Sally S