Anything can happen

Today I came across something interesting and unusual. As I was headed to lunch at mom's house, I noticed a van in front of me with the front passenger door partially open. The passenger had his right foot on the rocker panel and his right hand was holding the door open. Since I'm not in a marked police unit, I couldn't initiate the traffic stop. I didn't know what the passenger's intentions were. I thought maybe he was about to jump out of the moving vehicle!  I got on the radio and started calling for a marked unit to assist. I followed the van several blocks before it finally pulled off the road and parked at a residence. I got out of my vehicle and motioned for the passenger to approach the front of my vehicle. The occupants turned out to be an older couple. When I asked the gentleman if he had a reason for riding with his door open, he stated, "I was hot." I then reworded my question and asked if he had a "good" reason for riding with his door open. Then he explained that he was returning home from dialysis and the a/c didn't work and he couldn't roll down the window. I then gave him other alternatives when faced with the same problem later. One was maybe try pulling over and finding some shade for a minute or going to a store with a/c. Before you ask, No I didn't write them a ticket!

Every day is different

Every day you go to work as a Police Officer, you never know what you will come across. People call the police for the dumbest things, but I'll save that for another post. This is my first post on the blog so I'll share a story about a call I handled today. Here goes . . .

While handling a complaint for a burglary, I was wrapping things up there and giving my good bye's when we heard a loud bang. One of the staff looked through the fence surrounding the property and yelled, "don't throw trash in our dumpster!" With this being an offense, and clearly upsetting the property owners, I went after the "perp." (We don't really use that word at work but for all of you tv watchers, I thought I would throw it in.) After making the stop, I asked if he had just thrown something away in the dumpster and he stated yes. I informed him that he was breaking the law and asked what it was he put in the dumpster. He replied, "a parking meter." I wasn't sure I heard right and asked again. When he said a parking meter again, I ordered him to turn around and meet me near the dumpster. I looked inside the recently emptied dumpster and found a working parking meter with the digital read out still blinking. After advising the subject of his rights, I began questioning him. The subject, which was determined to be a local college student, and which I assumed had some intelligence, advised he found it in the bed of his truck after a class he attended on campus. I asked if he had ever seen such a thing (parking meter) before and he advised there were some downtown. When asked if he knew who it might belong to, the idiot stated, "I dont know." I suggested that it probably belonged to city government and he quickly agreed. I asked if he thought the city would want their stolen property back and he told me he didn't know who to call. I suggested . . . maybe 9-1-1! After taking a closer look at the meter, I also suggested that he propbably could have called one of the two phone numbers posted on the meter! Heck, he could have stopped to talk to the officer in the police car he had to pass up to get to the dumpster!

Clearly, the "perp" has a long road ahead of him if he plans on completing college. Well, maybe not. Common sense doesn't play a big part in passing exams that are derived from reading text or listening to a lecture.

Also, if you are wondering . . . no i didn't arrest him for possession of stolen property. I figured him having to go through life with such few brain cells was punishment enough.

There you have it. One of the many stories I have to tell from the last 10 years of being a police officer.