Done!!! Finally Over!! WAHOOOOOOOOOO!!!

I finished my basic training as a police officer yesterday. I finally get to hit the streets and be my own cop. One year and one month later it is all over. I want to thank everyone who helped me along the way. I want to say a special thanks to my wife for putting up with the crazy schedule and late nights as a trainee taking the last call of the night. I just can't wait to work on Saturday. Do things at my pace and my time. Listen to what ever radio programming I please. Turn my police radio up as loud as I want and drive how I please not trying to impress anyone. The best thing is no more haunting eyes over my shoulder at every turn. If I do something it will be because its what I decided to do, not because its what I think someone wants.

I went through some interesting emotions this week. A 62 year old woman was pistol whipped in the head and had her finger broken all for a purse and a ring. If your starting to feel angry at the people who did it imagine sitting at the hospital with her watching her head swell and the doctors worrying about her brain bleeding. I don't think I've ever felt anger like that in my entire life. I'm still pissed. I know I'm not suppose to take the job to heart like that, and I'm not suppose to take it home, but if you saw the look in her family's eyes you'd fall apart. The suspects are less than vulchers. They don't deserve to exist in this world. There is no argument to be made for why anyone would do what these guys did. All the psychology behind crime doesn't give an excuse for the cowardice of these criminals. This is the reason I got into law enforcement. So when we find who did this, and we will, we can serve justice.

Its fun being the PoPo

I had a great day today. A really really great day. I arrested two guys for being dummies and could have made it three for the day on a really good traffic stop if it wasn't for my soft heart. So don't call me callus and determined to be a prick because I really could have ruined this guys day along with his wife and kids.

The first guy, or really kid because hes only 21, I arrested today was for Assaulting his 17 year old girlfriend. He meets her for some goofy reason and they end up arguing with each other. She starts to leave and locks her car and he starts pounding on the window demanding something. By her mistake she rolls down her window and he grabs her by the hair. She opens the door and he forces his way in and drives her around the block a couple of times. He stops the car and steals her keys and runs away. He actually has the nerve to come back to where shes at and we arrest him. He was pretty close to being charged with kidnapping. I may still file on him for robbery because he tried to steal her purse from her and punched her in the face with it. This poor girl was hysterical when we found her. She really thought this guy was going to kill her or something. Totally ridiculous for kids to be fighting like that or doing things so outrageous. These youth are messed up these days.

The next guy I arrested was drunk like a skunk...or on one of the 38 Xanax pills I found in his pocket that weren't prescribed to him. And what do they all say, "Those aren't my pills, someone gave those to me, I was just holding onto them". This guy says some girl told him the manager at a bar raped her. So this guy actually thinks that hes going to do something about it. When he leaves the bar he breaks the exit door shattering all the glass. We find him across the street at another bar. Hes claiming he didn't know the girl and that she stole a bunch of stuff from him that he suddenly had possession of. When he got his stuff back she left him the pills and rather than saying no he puts them in his pocket. So this 19 year old kid thinks holding onto a bunch of pills is a good idea.

Well in case you didn't know, just so there isn't any confusion about how the law is applied, if its in your pocket you possess it. That is the law...Possession of Substance. And if your ever prescribed anything do not take it out of the original bottle. Keep it in the bottle because you have to do that. You need the label with the doctor's name, prescription drug, and phone number to the pharmacy. Otherwise it is illegal. Do not let anyone tell you otherwise. You might go to jail for it.

So I end up with three charges on the drunk guy because we come to find out he destroyed some other property that belonged to the anothe business and I get two charges on the jackass 21 year old. I hope he gets a little intimidation while hes in jail. He thinks bullying around a 105 pound 17 year old girl is tuff guy stuff. We'll see what he thinks after tonight.

Jamaican BBQ, Tubing the River, and Relaxation Afternoon

I won't have a three day weekend for just about eternity from now. I'm really happy I was able to enjoy the one I just had so much. Great timing for my friend's annual party. Usually it falls around Cinco time in May but it was held a little late this year. She decided to change it to Jamaica Beach Party. Which worked out great in the end. They made Jerk Chicken with grilled plantains, pineapple, and papya. We washed it all down with Dark and Stormies and Rum Punch. We spent the rest of the night playing Wii sports and Dance Dance Revolution. Unfortunately I missed the dancing while I was sitting outside smoking the traditional get together cigar. I feel like a wimp though because by midnight I was completely out of it. We did start the afternoon at 3 with some beers at a pub, but I'm only 26. I really shouldn't be falling out so early.

We woke up the next day and enjoyed some omelet breakfast. We left around noon to the Comal River to do what everyone in the Hill Country does on a hot summer weekend...Tubing!! By the way, don't use Felger's tubing...they suck. Stick with the larger ones like Rocking R or Corner Tubes. We're suppose to get picked up by these yahoos and ten minutes of waiting and no one shows up. Its only like half a mile down the road back but after a few beers and two hours in the sun I really don't like caryying my tube back. The sun was bright and the water was cool and it was damn near perfect conditions for a day on the river. We had lots of fun. They definitely need some freakin rain up there though because I hit my ass on a large rock in a more than usual shallow section.

My two year anniversary was on Friday. I had to work all day so we didn't really do anything. Since we had plans the rest of the weekend we decided we'll do something on Monday. So we made massage appointments for ourselves. I feel so much better now. I've been getting headaches steming from muscle tension in my back and it just would not go away. I hope this helped a bit. Then lucky us we went and picked up the doggies at the in-laws and they invited us to stay for dinner. Rib dinner for me tonight topped off with strawberry short cake desert. I love eating at my in-laws...also such good food.

The weekend coudln't have been better than how it turned out. Spend time with friends I don't always get to see. Eat a bunch of good home cooked food. Enjoy the summer heat the right way. Some day all my weekends will be like this one. I think it's a good goal to work towards.

Day Off and Nuttin to Do

Love my job...love what I do...I look forward to working every time I go into work. But man the days off suck!! Monday and Tuesday this week. No one has Monday and Tuesday off. My wife has work and class on both Monday and Tuesday. I have all this beer and all this food I'm cooking for dinner tonight and no one to share it with. Such is the life of a shift working cop.

So anyone want to drive over for some ribs?!? Leave work early and make it a special Tuesday night bash at my place! Don't bring to many friends though...I don't have that many ribs.

Right Place at the Right Time

If you don't believe in pure dumb luck I would start now!

I'm driving around all night long looking for something interesting to get into. The town is pretty quite at night. Very little traffic and no many calls to speak of. I'm on the main street through town, hoping to find a car with drugs or drunk drivers, waiting at a traffic light to turn around and I hear a loud thumping noise coming from behind me. This big F-150 goes past me doing about 45 or 50 with two flat right tires. I get so excited!! This dude has to be wasted out of his mind to be driving that fast with two flat tires. I pull out behind it and wait for it to make its turn onto another road and pull it over. The shit is on now!

I walk up and its a freakin kid. A kid who looks about 14 and ends up being 16. I think to myself, self there isn't shit I can do with this kid except call his parents and get the vehicle towed. He doesn't have a license and therefore no insurance. Best I can do is write a ticket. Thats when things get a bit more interesting. I check his name and birth date and surprise surprise to me he's a runaway kid. No wonder he's driving a car with flat tires and doesn't seem concerned because he doesn't want to go home anyway. So now we call the parents. Dad says he doesn't know whos truck it is. Kid says it's his friend who lives next door. Then he says its the same neighbors dad's truck. The registration comes back to a business and its 1 in the morning and of course they aren't open. We find a pill bottle in the console and theres a name, address, and phone number on it. We can't reach anyone on the phone so another unit checks by at the house.

This house is no where near this kids house. Not exactly a neighbor. The other officer knocks on the door and asks the guy if he owns a white Ford F-150. The guy walks out the door and "What the F**K!!!" is the only thing the guy says.

The kid's arrested now and all the way to juvenile detention he's calm and not worried and almost bragging about the fact that he stole this truck. I probably won't stumble on anything like that again in my life. The truck wasn't even reported stolen yet. The kid wasn't from our city and probably wouldn't have been a recovered runaway for another week or so. I couldn't have phathomed this was the case when I first saw that truck. So if you don't believe in luck, I was lucky, the owner was lucky, and the kid was lucky he was a freakin 16 year old and not a 17 year old. I'll make sure to find him again and arrest him as an adult so he really goes to jail.

Alcohol may be the Root of all EVIL

It would be cliche of me to generalize all family violence as the result of an alcoholic husband. That would only feed to the mainstream notion that all alcoholics are abusers, that only men are abusers, and that only men are alcoholics. I've only been on patrol for 3 months and haven't handled a lot of cases. I can only attest to what I've seen or heard and nothing of what I'm saying is using any empirical data to back it up other than my own experience.

Three cases of assault/family violence. Every single one of them was the result of a drunken husband. Every one of them the actor was intoxicated to some degree during the assault. To some extent the female victim was injured or felt pain. The women don't share anything in common. Their degree of education and work experience are all different. The men are all drunks. Their level of education and work are closer with the exception of one of them the apitomy of a loser. I don't have family history on any of the men or women. One of the women had been in an abusive marriage before. One of the women is an immigrant on visa status. One of the women had a child at home with them at the time it occured. There aren't any common charateristics except the men are alcoholics.

So if you did a study based on these three cases the conclusion is simple. 100 % of the time alcohol is a factor in the abuse. The abuser will be a male alcoholic. The victim will be his wife and no one else. I don't like absolutes typically but this is a pretty sure statistic thus far. I know three cases aren't enough for comparison to apply to a populace as a whole. I'd obviously need to extend my group and include controls like alcholic men who aren't married but date as well as cases of alcohol involved assaults where the man isn't an admitted alcholic.

I think this would've made for a more interesting research topic than the one I did during school. Although this wouldn't be nearly as complicated or expensive a study as my proposed idea while I was in school. All I would need is access to police records (I have that) and contact information for the individuals and lots of cell phone minutes. Might make for a good Doctorate dissertation some day.

More Posts to Come

I know I know I know...10 days without a new update. Cool things have been going on at work and I have plenty to write about but night shift sucks and I don't have the energy this week to think clearly. So let me leave you with this short break down.

Right place at the right time stolen vehicle recovery.

Alcohol may be the root of most evil.

Why aren't kids just kids anymore?

But I just got a ticket last week Officer, please don't write me another one.

These are all great stories that will be talked about in more detail later.