Ringing In

I've decided a couple of things lately.

1. I suck at keeping up with this blog. Part of it is lack of anything interesting to say, part of it is a genuine feeling of apathy. Quite frankly, my life hasn't been the most fulfilling of late, but I am taking steps to fix that.

2. I have set a deadline for some big life changes. I want to apply to my hometown police department in 2011. In the meantime, I will be getting in shape and losing weight, hunting for an apartment in Central VA, and getting back into Academy form in terms of my shooting.

3. I need to find something that makes and keeps my happy. A lot of the trouble I've been having with being motivated to improve things has been due to being generally unhappy. I have taken up gardening, or at least caring for plants, but obviously that's not terribly time consuming in the middle of winter. Perhaps part of my change to a happier me should include moving on to new employment until I am ready to reapply to the Police Department.

Reboot

So, it's been five months since I resigned my post at the Police Department, roughly two months since I found out that I wasn't welcome back. Besides that, its been a little over a year since some other major changes in my life. As such, this blog will turn from a chronicle of my time as a rookie Police Officer, to more of a general observation of my life; in other words, more of a journal.

If the past year has taught me anything, its not to take anything for granted. I lost a lot of things near and dear to me (my dream job, the love of my life) , thanks to lapses in judgment. As much as I would love to go back and reset, I can't. I have always said, the true measure of a man is how he recovers from setbacks.

So, I have started making forward strides. I am still working as a waiter for the time being, and trying to get back into University to complete my degree. More updates to come.

Set Back

So it turns out, my chosen department has decided not to take me back.

Thanks for all your support, but now I have to sit back and decide what to do next.

Re-up

I realized not too long ago that the past year or so for me has been one of constant change, most of it negative. First, I dropped out of college, which wasn't too much of a loss, since I didn't want to be there in the first place. The real loss there was the fact that I left without a degree, basically wasting three years of my life. Second, my girlfriend of three years left me. That struck me hard, as I saw a definite future with her, and in all honesty, I still do miss and love her. Finally, in a move I thought could only end well, I got hired to my local police department. Things went smoothly until I ultimately failed to qualify with my sidearm.

So, I have had around 13 months to think, evaluate, and act on these changes. As far as the first: I plan on going back to school at some point. Quite simply, if I plan on advancing in anything, I'll need that fancy piece of paper. Regarding the ex, well, that's for another blog.

Now my career, that I'll share:

Almost exactly a year after my first application to the department, I put in a fresh one. Since resigning I've wrestled with a lot of things, namely: is this what I really want to do? Am I cut out for this? Do I really want to sit through another 5 months of training? While I'm not thrilled about the prospect of repeating my training, I know this is something I want to do, and I know I need to make some adjustments to be successful this time:

1. I need to get into better shape. I started the last academy overweight and out of shape. While my size was a benefit in some cases (defensive tactics/ground fighting) it did not serve me well during our PT. I could make the excuse that I didn't really know what to expect, but the fact is I overestimated my ability, and underestimated the toll four years of a near sedentary lifestyle took on me.

2. Obviously I need to get out to the range. I've been skeet shooting a couple times, but shooting clay pigeons, and shooting for my sidearm quals are two different things. I haven't been able to yet, due to some financial restrictions, but I am trying desperately to get some rounds downrange.

3. I need a little bit of an attitude adjustment. I went into my last academy my usual cocky, laid back, flippant self. There are situations where that's alright, but I have to do a better job of recognizing when is a good time.

So, here's to hoping I get another shot (no pun intended). Maybe if this works, some other things will fall into place.

Publicity

So, we already know that if the media puts out stories about the police force, odds are its going to be in a negative light. I understand the marketing angle of "if it bleeds, it leads", however, wouldn't it be beneficial to not paint the city's protectors in sinister shades, causing more distrust from the already fickle public?

Grandma Rides the Lightning

OK, just because you're a senior doesn't mean an officer isn't going to do his job. The report here alleges the woman "dared the officer to taze her"...so he did. I think the TASER is a wonderful tool (that's probably because I haven't been taken for my ride yet), and I think the officer involved made the right decision. Could he have deployed his OC? Yes, but without any prior knowledge of the driver's medical history, that could be just as risky. The fact of the matter is: he was confronted by an unruly suspect and needed to gain control of the situation. An old woman is just as capable of injuring or killing an officer as anyone else. However, the public doesn't get that angle, all they know is the big mean police officer just shocked gramma, adding to complaints that they shouldn't be deployed by police forces.

Four year old bitten by K9

While this story is pretty sad, it still falls within the realm of hazards of duty. While searching for a murder suspect, the K9 was released, whereupon it found the child sleeping, and proceeded to do what it had been trained to do: attack anyone it found hiding. The family has hired a lawyer, obviously, but this is a situation that really isn't any one's fault. It is unfortunate that the child now is even more afraid of dogs, and now possibly the police, but watching the video makes me feel like at least one of those biases is going to be reinforced by the family. The aunt makes it sound as if it were a savage attack. From the look of it, yes I'm sure it was traumatizing, however the child's wounds appear superficial, not to mention it really could have been avoided if say, you had turned in his father or provided some possible whereabouts, since he is wanted in the death of a 20 year old man.

Every story has multiple sides, I just want people to understand we aren't the bad guys. Sometimes things look a bit heavy-handed, but considering what could happen if officers were to think constantly about what the media will say, I guess we'll have to settle for being painted as bullies.

So my latest post isn't nearly as happy as my previous ones: I've washed out of the Academy.

It's pretty heartbreaking, seeing as I was four weeks out from graduation, and only had a handful of certifications to go. The culprit: weapons qualification.

So I have to decide what to do now. Do I wait until I'm eligible for my chosen Academy, try one of the local jurisdictions, or go to my city's Sheriff's Office?

Home Stretch

For the end of an Academy, it sure has been busy. Most of what we've been doing is real world simulations, preparing us for situations we may encounter, mixed in with more certifications.

April 13-17- This week was a fairly random week, with situations we will most likely not encounter in our careers, as well as being fitted for our WMD gear. We were taught how to respond to bomb threats, and how to conduct surveillance. Our class also managed to break the pre-existing Academy push-up record of 365 over eight hours, accomplishing 736 in the same time frame.

April 20-24- This was a fun week, consisting of our shotgun quals, ballistic shield work, and officer rescues/bunkering a police vehicle. I did surprisingly well with the 12 guage, prompting jokes that I may just carry a shotgun at all times, since I was having trouble qualifying with my .45.

April 27-May 1- This week involved a lot of travel between our range facility, our dojo, and our training center learning how to conduct high risk stops, ground fighting techniques, and basic patrol techniques.

May 4-May 8- We started learning some pretty intense things this week, such as active shooter scenarios (kicked off with footage and 911 calls from Columbine), unusual shooting positions (shooting from our backs, while seated, and from a vehicle), and finally receiveing our new weapons (goodbye S&W 4586, HELLLLO S&W M&P, I am in love with that gun)

May 11-15- We started the week marching in our city's Memorial March to honor our fallen officers, learning gang intelligence, and how to conduct K9 ops.

Which brings us to the present. With only five and a half weeks left in the Academy, I'll be hitting the street soon, and cannot wait.

Playing Catch-up

So, since I've been lazy lately I owe quite a bit of an update:

The past couple weeks have gone well at the Academy. Our class has just passed the halfway point, and still have all 24 members. From what I understand, we've made it through some of the toughest areas, and are on the home stretch. Since my last update (defensive tactics for those keeping score at home...my jaw recovered nicely) we've completed Survival Spanish, Drug Enforcement, and Defensive Driving.

Survival Spanish was interesting, especially with the large Hispanic community in my city. At the time of the class I thought I was able to communicate slightly in Spanish. After speaking, or attempting to speak, with one of my neighbors I found that I am sadly mistaken. He knew just as much English as I do Spanish, making coherent conversation impossible. With that in mind, I have set to actually learning the language, since I figure it will help immensely in the near future.

Driving was where the fun was at. I was pretty liberating to finally get to do things with a car that I've wanted to do since I got my license. I am a little irritated with my score on the night pursuit course, but besides that I scored very well.

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What I really want to touch on is the recent rash of officer fatalities. As a sign of respect, my class keeps a tally of officers lost in the line of duty. At the beginning of the class it was around one officer every three days, which is pretty disturbing. However, what's alarming is the eight officers lost in a week. The majority of the officers lost were on "routine" calls: a traffic stop and a domestic. So far we have had it drilled into our heads that no call is "routine" and to NEVER become complacent, because that's how people get hurt. It's not my place to Monday morning quarterback the decisions of those officers; those men combined would have forgotten more about police work than I can ever hope to learn. I am upset that both cases involved suspects armed with high powered assault rifles, and in one case, body armor. I don't intend this to become a commentary on gun control either, or who should or should not be allowed to own weapons. Those men are cowards, who in cold blood, killed men who were doing their jobs, with families to support, for what? Because they didn't want to go to jail? Even though they had broken the law?

But I digress.

Ultimately, these incidents will do a couple things: 1) I get the feeling that there will be policy changes across the board coming down the pipe, ranging from new response procedures to new weaponry for police units to new training procedures in the academies; and 2) Cadets all over the country, such as myself are learning things that may save them from the same fate. Those brave men will continue saving lives: countless hundreds of their brothers and sisters coming up

With much Respect for our Brothers/Heroes
The Rookie

Fight Club

My class has just completed our Defensive Tactics training. We managed to make it through with only one major injury (one recruit fractured his collarbone during our fleeing suspect drills), and only a few bumps and bruises. When it came to practicals time, we all passed our scenarios as well, so we are still 24 strong heading into week nine of twenty-two.

Having wrestled in the past, I had a blast learning the various takedowns and holds early in the week. Things took a slightly more somber turn when we started learning potentially life saving techniques such as escaping chokes, disarming suspects, and weapon retention drills. Everything culminated with our practical, which started as a demonstration of what we had learned, and ended in a Redman scenario.

The scenario was very exciting, and I assume, and extremely close recreation of what may actually happen. When my partner and I entered the room, two men were arguing over a woman. Before we had the chance to announce ourselves, a punch was thrown, and we leapt into action. My partner went to assist the victim while I squared up with the suspect. Here's where I made my mistake: when I approached the suspect I stood less than two feet away from him. I tried to calm him down, and went for soft hand control: I put one hand on his chest while telling him to move to another area of the room. At this point the instructor in the suit made me pay for being too close; he nailed me with a crushing left hook square in the jaw.

That made me mad.

Immediately I went to perform a takedown on him. In doing so, I managed to tear his arm guard right off, which earned me another punch to the head. As I pushed him away to reassess, my partner came streaking across the room, Asp in hand, and started laying into the suspect, ending the scenario.

Ultimately we passed, thanks to our teamwork and handling of the situation. After all this excitement, next week is back into the classroom for crime scenes, which doesn't sound nearly as fun.

Stay Safe
-The Rookie

Sorry folks!

I didn't forget about you guys, just been really busy.

Where did we leave off? I think last time I posted was right before DUI week. My certification for DUI stops went off without a hitch. We actually had a simulated DUI stop as our practical, with actual drunk volunteers. We were to conduct our SFSTs, fill out the paperwork related to a DUI arrest, and then present our case to the "magistrate".

Outside of the paperwork, the whole process was pretty fun. To be perfectly honest, I would not have arrested my volunteer since he managed to pass my SFSTs (standardized field sobriety tests). On the street, I actually would have had to let him go, despite his Alco-sensor being over the legal limit, since I didn't have any probable cause to take him to the arrest.

Next up was Firearms. Having never fired or even handled a weapon, I had some initial troubles to get over, and eventually did...or so I thought.

Throughout my qualification practices I consistently scored in the high 50s mid 60s. Unfortunately, that falls short of final weapons qual by between 2-5 bullets on target. I think I have corrected my little mistakes. I still have one more shoot to make, and I'm actually pretty nervous.

Next week is the second of three weeks I've been looking forward to: Defensive Tactics. Something about throwing folks around to relieve frustration just makes me grin.

Keep you posted, and stay safe
-The Rookie

Stand By...

I'm still alive!

Things have been pretty hectic: We went through our DUI class last week, and this week we're on the range to qualify with our duty weapons. I'm doing fairly well I suppose for having never fired a weapon before.

All in all, I'm far too tired to make a detailed post right now. I'll try to have something for you by the weekend.

Metamorphosis

I knew what I signed up for. I knew that as a police officer I would be exposed to some of the worst behavior humans can exhibit. As one instructor put it, we see people on the worst day of their life, and often times, multiple people on the worst day of their life. We encounter anger, sadness, evil, even death, and have to remain calm enough to fulfill our duties.

This all leads into this past week at the Academy. Studying crimes against persons and juvenile law turned into probably one of the most gruesome things I've had to endure in my life. As part of our studies we examined crime scene photos of homicides and particularly gory suicides. Crime scenes don't bother me, seeing a guy after he shoots himself in the head with a high powered rifle doesn't phase me. What really touched the core of my being was one video we were shown. This video was created by a man as he committed suicide. The idea was that we (the police) would find the video to show that it was in fact a suicide so that there wouldn't be an investigation, starting with his wife. The video runs through his death, his wife finding him, and the medics responding to the scene. As I've said: gore, guts, and blood don't bother me. However, watching a man die in front of you is a pretty heart wrenching experience. To cap off the week, our next instructor was a SVU detective, who shared stories of his cases.

The idea behind all this, I think, is to desensitize us and to make us aware of the type of thing we will have to deal with. Police work isn't the glamorous profession depicted by Hollywood; it isn't all car chases and heroic shootouts. If we arrive to a scene and we have an emotional reaction we lose our effectiveness. I'd have to say it worked. By the sixth hour of examining crime scenes, the class was able to crack jokes, while being able to spot out evidence and clues to what may have happened.



On a lighter note, I almost had a heart attack this morning when I woke up and saw that it was 0640, leaving me 10 minutes to pick up my partner and make it to the Academy. I was already planning my "To-From" letter to the instructors explaining why I was late, when I realized: It's Sunday".

Police Officers are an interesting bunch. All the people in my class have left significantly safer jobs to risk our lives for others on a daily basis. Some were military, some are parents, some were students. Me? I was a waiter. We all did it for a reason though. Granted our reasons were different, but we know the risks involved in our profession.

Training is fairly intense. We take at least one test every three days or so, which we have to pass at 100%. So between studying, PT, and general life, our hands are full. So far we've made it through two tests, and have another on Monday. Fortunately, we have not only a supportive staff of instructors, but the class has become fairly tight in the two weeks we've been together. Our goal is to come in with 24, and leave with 24. With 20 weeks to go, we're still got some ground to cover.

Essentially what I want to do here is chronicle my time in the Academy, and my career in Law Enforcement. You'll hear the good and you'll hear the bad, hopefully more of the good. Every so often I'll provide an update as to my status and the status of the class.

Right now: I'm tired

Stand By

Stand by for traffic...