Posted at 10:33 AM in Court, Operations | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)
Funding
People don’t seem to want to pay for anything anymore if they do not see immediate benefit for themselves.
We as a people seem to forget the emergency services are there IF we need them not just when we need them.
Over the course of my life here in the West Coast, I have seen funding bleed out of all of the State and Local services and the dependency on Federal dollars increase with that decline.
The amount of pressure on the services has a direct correlation with what is seen on the ground. Response times suffer; investigations are slow, preventative actions cease.
Stumptown is running very lean on Law Enforcement personnel. When I did my ride along years ago, the force was about 25% stronger then it is today. I see the strain in my friends that serve as they try to hold to the level of service they once provided.
Angry letters to local papers show that the expectations are high.
For the average citizen investment in the potential need is very low.
Posted at 01:40 PM in The other side | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack (0)
"Caught in the moment"
Bouncing rain.
We hunker in the cab, a line of police vehicles alongside, a hurriedly organised muster point for us all.
The police sergeant briefs us, water pouring from the peak of his cap.
The firearms unit are in position. The dogs are heading in to back them up.
We’re to follow them to the locus.
The dog van peels out, the same make and model as our Rapid Response Units.
We can’t keep up.
Hopped up in the excitement of the moment, the K9 unit hurtles into the distance and swings into the estate. In moments he’s vanished.
We’re left creeping down avenues and groves, darkened houses and orange lights in bucketing rain.
Somebody, somewhere nearby, has a gun. And is apparently quite happy to turn it on strangers.
He’s already shot somebody this evening, I don’t want to be next on the list.
Frank terror is tinged with school boy adrenaline excitement. It tingles from my arsehole to my scalp. I’m shivering in the heated cab.
We slide past the end of a street and spot the dog van, slewed at the diagonal across the road, behind it the anonymous, heavily armoured Range Rover that transports the armed unit.
The dog handler is out of his vehicle. He is not wearing the ballistic armour and helmet of the armed response staff. He points at us aggressively and shouts at the top of his voice.
“Stay there! Don’t move!”
Fair enough. I pull the handbrake, shut down the lights and wait. One of our Special Ops vehicles pulls in behind with an extra paramedic to back us up.
The dog handler is striding up and down in front of the house, yelping into his radio. We slide out of the cab and coordinate our equipment, oxygen, bag and defib; just in case we need to move in a hurry. The cop is apoplectic at our exitting the vehicle.
“Get behind cover! Get in behind the cover!”
We peer out at him from behind the cover we already occpuy. He is, apparently, bullet proof - marching around as he is in a fleece and uniform. Given the choice I’ll take my chances hiding behind the ambulance’s engine block over a few layers of polyester and serge.
But then, this isn’t my job.
After a few minutes he calls over to us, beckons us in and as we approach he shouts again.
“Only three of you! You can only bring three in!”
I look at my two colleagues. There are only three of us on scene.
I don’t have an extra paramedic in my pocket; I’m just pleased to see him.
The cop leads us to the front door of the house, hissing at us to walk in single file, bent double at the waist. I fret that things are more serious than we thought - if we’re having to take such precautions, maybe the assailant is still on scene and in a tense standoff with the police upstairs.
The dog handler pushes us into the lee of the ascending staircase inside the hall, creeps up the stairs and then beckons to us to join him, his fingers dancing in pidgin semaphore like an extra in a cheap Nam movie.
“You...three...follow...me”
We sneak up the steps, looking left and right as we go. At the top of the stairs stands an armed riot cop. Clad in heavy armour, the helmet and visor enclosing his head completely, a mask pulled up over his mouth and nose. An MP5 swings patiently at his chest.
He looks enormous, the shoulder and chest rig bulking him into super-human proportions. Given the option of fighting him or throwing down my weapons and shitting myself, I’d be taking the latter.
His eyes smile in greeting as we approach and he laughs at our canine cop, “Don’t get so fucking excited, it’s embarassing.”
The patient is sitting up, slugged with a .22 in the chest and astonishingly stable, I check him out for collapsing lungs, blood in his chest or abdomen. He needs nothing more than a wide-bore IV, a slow bag of fluid and a fast run to hospital, just in case.
Guns aren’t a fact of life in Scotland, our police aren’t armed as a matter of course and firearms incidents are few and far between. They frighten us, like farm boys lost in the city, dazzled by lights and startled by engines. We turn to the police for our safety and security and they do a sterling job in supporting us.
But they’re just human.
And some of them are just as scared as us.
Posted at 01:30 AM | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBack (0)
Ride Along
I went for a Ride Along with RD a long time ago and have been trying to schedule a second one for some time to no avail. We are all so busy and now I want to wait a bit until the latest consolidation mess has settled a bit before I volunteer as dead weight on a night’s work.
Not sure what to expect on my first ride along, I signed all of the waivers the administration required, watched the preparations for the evening shift change and really felt like an outsider inside of the Precinct, officers and staff moving with purpose through, what I thought was, cramped quarters.
Equipment check, vehicle check, list of ‘if you have time’ priorities and outstanding calls, and then we were off.
Now honestly, for the first half of the night it was pretty much a blur but relatively calm. Evidence pickup at an auto body shop, response to a cold call about a stolen car, and a backup to a couple of stops before a mid-shift break.
The second half of the night was much more ‘exciting’. A couple of stops for violations, more assists, a high speed race across town to assist in the search for a suspect on foot cordoning off a large area to allow the dogs to track the perp, and a scare at a local college.
“Is it always like this?”
“More often then not”
-Claude
Instinct
On the ride along, I noticed the way in which Raindog was always watching the environment without actually paying full attention to it. I, of course, asked a crud load of questions, and he answered me while driving occasionally pausing to listen to the radio traffic.
Lights go on, the siren blurts a short burst…before I know it we are accelerating around the corner of an intersection that we had been approaching, pulling up behind a moderately well kept sedan which picks a side street, and pulls over.
“What did he do?” I ask.
“He didn’t stop fully at the intersection.” RD replies.
“Lots of people don’t stop.”
“Yeah, but this guy is driving without a license.”
“How do you know?”
“Just a gut feeling.” He replies shortly as he types in the plate number into the computer and reads the vehicle and owner profile. “He has several citations for lack of insurance.”
All business, Raindog approaches the car, talks to the driver then comes back to the prowler. “Expired license” he says before he radios a tow truck.
I have asked many questions of him over the years on how that works.
He can’t explain to me it is just a fact, just instinct.
-Claude
Posted at 12:32 AM in The other side | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBack (0)
