A wake-up call

A big problem in police work is the risk of becoming complacent. It’s so very easy to do. You take a million 911 hang-up calls that turn out to be misdials. You take a million burglar calls that are false alarms set off by the weather. Eventually, officers start to assume that every 911 call is simply a misdial and every burglar alarm is a false one.

We forget that a 911 hang-up could be caused by someone who only had time to dial before something bad happened. That burglar alarm could be the real deal and there may actually be armed intruders inside.

It reminds me of the recent incident where three Odessa police officers were shot and killed while responding to a domestic disturbance. The police spokesman made a point of mentioning that police had been called to the residence several times in the past but it had never been violent before. Well, that didn’t count for shit in the long term did it?

Complacency happens to everyone. I remember a time when I was getting too relaxed on traffic stops. I had been doing the job for around four years and thought I was on top of my game. At that point, I’d been on so many stops that I was on autopilot for some of them. Heck, nothing had happened to me yet so I must have been doing things right. Well, one incident happened that pretty much woke me the hell up.

One night I was sitting in my unit when I saw a vehicle drive the wrong way down a one-way street in a residential neighborhood. This road was typically a two-way but one lane had been closed due to construction. I know this wasn’t the crime of the century but I’d caught several drunk drivers watching this area.

I pulled over the vehicle and came up on the passenger side. The driver was a middle-aged woman who seemed friendly. This made me even more relaxed. She appeared sober so I immediately started thinking about what I wanted to do after I gave her a warning.
I made contact with the driver and told her why I had pulled her over. She stated that she didn’t know the street was only for one-way traffic and I replied that there was a sign a little ways back that said so. She asked where the sign was and I turned away from her while pointing back towards the traffic sign.

As I turned my head back toward her, I saw that she had reached across under the passenger seat and her hand was coming back up.

It took me a split second to process that her hand was holding a .357 revolver and the barrel was swinging towards me. To this day, I remember every detail about that pistol. I remember the wooden handle with the dark color, the blue gun metal that was worn down along the cylinder, and especially the huge howitzer of a barrel.

I couldn’t have been more surprised if she had pulled out a freaking magic wand that was dripping fairy dust. She had me dead to rights and I didn’t have any time to draw my gun. The first thing I thought was, “She got me.” It’s funny how you react to things. I could have backpedaled while trying to draw. I could have froze, or I could have tried to dodge alongside her vehicle.

Instead, I was within reaching distance so I dove into the window of the car with both hands out. Watching the video later, you could hear me yelling, “Whoa, whoa whoa!!” As I dove in, I grabbed the gun and violently twisted it out of her hands. I then backed up and covered her with her own gun while I yelled at her to get on the ground.

She immediately started trying to explain that she was only going to show me the gun so I would know that she was armed. She said she didn’t want me to think she was trying to hide it from me. Once I got her cuffed and I started breathing again, I let her explain. Apparently, she is licensed to carry a gun and keeps it under the seat. She also knew that she was supposed to let police officers know that there’s a gun in the car if she gets pulled over. While she didn’t just tell me instead of sticking it my face, I don’t know.

I ended up unloading her gun, throwing the bullets across the road and then throwing the gun in her backseat. After a few choice words and threats, I sent her on her way. After all that was over, I sat in my car with my hands shaking. All I could think of was that old lady had me cold if she had intended to do something. I went up there like a dumb ass cadet with my head up my ass.

That, my friends, is the epitome of a wake-up call. From then on, I have worked according to the three Ps.

1. Be Professional
2. Be Polite
3. Have a Plan to kill every person you deal with

Be safe out there.