Men in White Coats

Most people don't know that there are no "Men in White Coats" that come and pick you up if you aren't "thinking straight." We don't wear white coats like you see in the movies or on tv. We wear blue police uniforms.

If you have a close friend or relative that you think is a danger to themselves or to someone else, you simple go down to the Coroner's office and get an Order of Protective Custody (OPC). Once the OPC is signed, the police department is notified and given a copy. It's now our job to pick this person up and take them to the medical facility listed on the OPC.

With that introduction, lets get down to what this post is about. The people we meet or come in contact with while executing OPC's. I don't want to offend anyone by posting this and I am not trying to make fun of these people. I know it is an illness and out of their control. When dealing with people with mental illness, I have found it is a lot better to treat them with respect and compassion and they usually come with me willingly to the hospital. One such subject I'll call "Mr. Brown." I had dealt with Mr. Brown many times and I guess I treated him pretty good because he took a liking to me. Mr. Brown is well over six feet tall and probably over 250 pounds. He is massive and not in an overweight kind of way but in a muscular way. Most of the time I came across Mr. Brown, he was homeless and in need of a shower. ** SIDE NOTE - not every homeless person is in need of your handouts or deserves them. Most of the ones I have dealt with choose to be homeless and rely on the kindness of others to support their addictions instead of becoming self sufficient.** Ok, back to Mr. Brown. For this story, Mr. Brown actually had a room at this boarding house. I was so glad to hear he had a place to stay but we were continously called to this boarding house because of Mr. Brown. On this occassion, we were let inside the house and were escorted to Mr. Brown's room. I could hear what sounded like loud music and a tv cranked up in the room. When we finally got him to answer, he recognized me and allowed us to go in. Once inside the room, Mr. Brown proudly began showing off his prize possessions. I had to chuckle a little to myself when I noticed a bible opened up on top of a couple porno magazines sitting on his bed. This combined with the crazy music playing on a little radio and Sister Angelica on the TV. While talking to Mr. Brown, a female officer asked him what he was chewing on. He removed what was determined to be a condom from his mouth and told us it was his gum. I was pretty stunned from this and hoped that it was a new one from its packaging, but I had my doubts when he began showing us the contents of his pockets. He began emptying his pockets after I explained to him that I had to take him to the hospital to see the doctor, I told him I needed to make sure he didn't have any weapons before getting into my car. He began pulling out all kinds of things from his pockets but what caught my eye was a tampon applicator. The other officer pointed to it and asked why he had it. He replied that it was his drinking straw!

By this time, we had been there for quite a while and needed to wrap things up and get Mr. Brown to the hospital. Our policy dictates that we have to place handcuffs on any subject that we transport like this. I really didn't want to have to fight with this giant of a man, especially since he was twice my size and the female officer that was with me was half my size. He agreed to come with me but asked that I put the handcuffs on outside instead of in the house in front of his roommates. On the way out, we had to go down this very narrow hallway that ran the length of the house. The house was not built as a boarding house but was converted and the hallway was unusually narrow. I followed directly behind Mr. Brown and was waiting for him to open the front door, when he quickly turned around and put his tree trunk arms around me in a bear hug. My heart dropped and I was completely at his mercy. I just knew it was about to get ugly until Mr. Brown said, "I love you!" The only thing I could do at this point was say, "I love you too" and "can you please put me down?" Mr. Brown gently brought my feet back down to the ground and went to the hospital without a fuss.

This is a long post so maybe next time I'll tell the story about the man that called the police because aliens from Avery Island were coming out of butt and talking to him through his TV.