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The job never fails to surprise...


Docwagon

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As most of the old hands know, I'm a cop in the States.  I made sergeant last July and left major felony investigations for a street supervisor position.  I am basically a front line supervisor to uniformed beat officers.   One of the things I do is decide if we're going to force entry into a residence, or if the officer decided to without me if they are justified in doing so.   The main reason we force doors without a warrant is because we have probable cause to believe someone is dead or dying inside.  Which leads us to this story.

 

The set up is elderly mother reports her son hasn't contacted her for four days, and that he normally comes to her house to shower and do laundry because his sewer hookup isn't working (code for: didn't pay water bill and water is turned off).  The last time she spoke with him he was having an asthma attack and told her he didn't have his medicine.  I went out and met two officers there, one brand new rookie and one with a couple years on.  The neighbors said he normally sat on his porch and harassed them by shooting their houses with BB guns but hadn't seen him for a few days.  The mail had stacked up in the mailbox.  Repeated knocking and announcing our presence got no response. That's all hallmarks of a dead guy in the house, so I told the rookie to kick the door in.

 

He got the door forced, gagged and backed out.  No biggie, I figured his first exposure to a severely decayed body and it gets a lot of rookies.  The more experienced officer starts to go in, comes out dry heaving, and doesn't get in the house either.  Bodies don't phase me, regardless of level of decomp, unless they are children.  I can babysit your decayed corpse then go eat lunch with no issue.  I've seen uncounted corpses at this point.  What I've NOT seen is rabbit shit about a foot deep in the house.  The guy was dead, but hadn't started to decay much yet.  However there was LITERALLY 8-12" of rabbit shit on the floor.  That's what had gagged the younger guys, they hadn't even got to the body yet.  There were 30 rabbits in the house and he apparently never cleaned up after them.  Every room in the house but two had a floor completely coated in rabbit shit, and those two had piles but hadn't covered the floor yet.

 

The guy was dead in the hallway with a painter's dust mask on.

 

I don't get a lot of "firsts" on the job any longer, but that was a first for me.

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That's an ace read Doc! Maybe he was planning some Easter bonanza with the neighbours? 🐇

 

Please keep these coming if you're allowed to share them.

 

And I'll echo Plumber Dave's message of congratulations on the promotion, Sir. Top work.

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I got to be somebody's hero today. Just a right place/right time thing but I was glad to be there to help. I kicked up a pursuit of a clown car full of robbery suspects. 5 were apprehended at the termination point, more fled. Seriously, clown car shenanigans. What I should have done is stay at the termination point and do sergeant-y stuff. What I did was snatch up my rifle and go with K9 because I'm fucking retarded and can't help myself. As we were walking over an overpass the K9 handler turned his head right and the dog jumped left...right over the barricade and into empty space. I saw the dog jump but before I could even open my mouth it as gone. Luckily the handler kept the end of the leash wrapped around his wrist. The weight of the dog jerked him up against the barricade and he was off balance. I was able to run up and grab the leash as well and help hoist the dog back up onto the overpass.

 

I don't know if the dog would have survived the drop but the handler said even if he had he'd probably have to be retired. He offered to buy me dinner at whatever I deemed to be my favorite restaurant but I told him snag my outstanding suspects and we'd be even. Two bit bad guys later I think we're good to go.

 

The termination point was just short of the county line and we had multiple agencies respond. I've never seen a better example of teamwork in law enforcement. Us, park rangers, two sheriff's departments, two neighboring districts, three dog handlers, and investigations all responded and took care of business. I'm pretty damned proud of the lot.

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On 7/29/2019 at 3:59 AM, Docwagon said:

I got to be somebody's hero today. Just a right place/right time thing but I was glad to be there to help. I kicked up a pursuit of a clown car full of robbery suspects. 5 were apprehended at the termination point, more fled. Seriously, clown car shenanigans. What I should have done is stay at the termination point and do sergeant-y stuff. What I did was snatch up my rifle and go with K9 because I'm fucking retarded and can't help myself. As we were walking over an overpass the K9 handler turned his head right and the dog jumped left...right over the barricade and into empty space. I saw the dog jump but before I could even open my mouth it as gone. Luckily the handler kept the end of the leash wrapped around his wrist. The weight of the dog jerked him up against the barricade and he was off balance. I was able to run up and grab the leash as well and help hoist the dog back up onto the overpass.

 

I don't know if the dog would have survived the drop but the handler said even if he had he'd probably have to be retired. He offered to buy me dinner at whatever I deemed to be my favorite restaurant but I told him snag my outstanding suspects and we'd be even. Two bit bad guys later I think we're good to go.

 

The termination point was just short of the county line and we had multiple agencies respond. I've never seen a better example of teamwork in law enforcement. Us, park rangers, two sheriff's departments, two neighboring districts, three dog handlers, and investigations all responded and took care of business. I'm pretty damned proud of the lot.

 

Nice story Doc, good on you for following gut instincts. Many coppers are forced into not being able to do the common sense approach.

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Been kind of a shit time to be a police officer in the US, but I'm on the downhill side now anyway so whatcha gonna do, amirite?

 

I placed high enough on the LT assessment that I should get promoted sometime in 2021, early 2022 by the latest.  I'm hoping to go back to Invest at some point once that's done.

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5 hours ago, Plumbers Crack said:

Hiya Doc..good to see you post again. Hope all is well with you and your family?

 

Don’t be a stranger 👍😊

 

Everything is going well.  COVID has my son attending high school from home, which has had it's challenges.  Wife's little online store is doing fine.  Everyone's healthy, etc.  We're hoping we can get to Spain next year so we don't lose the credits we have for airfare and hotel, but we'll see what happens.

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23 hours ago, Docwagon said:

 

Everything is going well.  COVID has my son attending high school from home, which has had it's challenges.  Wife's little online store is doing fine.  Everyone's healthy, etc.  We're hoping we can get to Spain next year so we don't lose the credits we have for airfare and hotel, but we'll see what happens.

 

Great to hear all is okay still, Doc. Home schooling is incredibly hard alongside everything else you have to do but its nice to see you in good spirits with everything. Not sure when we can travel as close to what we used to but i'd be hopeful we can do some things and go some places later on in 2021.

 

Are you able to get any gaming in around everything that's going on of late?

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On 11/8/2020 at 8:16 AM, GazzaGarratt said:

 

Great to hear all is okay still, Doc. Home schooling is incredibly hard alongside everything else you have to do but its nice to see you in good spirits with everything. Not sure when we can travel as close to what we used to but i'd be hopeful we can do some things and go some places later on in 2021.

 

Are you able to get any gaming in around everything that's going on of late?

 

I'm still playing Civ V mostly.  Even with as many hours in the game as I have I'm still figuring out new things and strategies.  It's still fun.

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