COPS

I got to have my own little version of Cops the other night. It was pretty much awesome!

My trainer at work had the day off so they decided it was time for me to have a ride along. I got to choose whether I wanted to go with County Deputies or the Caldwell Police. I chose police because, well-I love police work. That is what I have known for years at my last job. You wouldn't think so, but there is a big difference between City police and County deputies. In fact I have noticed several differences just in the personnel.

The dispatch I used to work for had all young hot females. The officers were also younger and more go-getters (city police). I felt like we worked as a team, we were on the inside finding the dirt on these guys and they were on the outside arresting them and doing all of the stuff I wouldn't want to do. The dispatch I work for now, much like their deputies are older, slower, have some attitude and really don't want to work much. Don't get me wrong, they are cool people!! But there is a big difference. So I was getting worried that I had seen the end of my exciting days.

That's when my ride along happened and it changed my whole perspective:

The picture above is just one of the calls we went on where they guy needed medics. This is me trying to get a picture of myself in action really fast so that no one would know what a nerd I was
At this call there was a 40 some old man who was jumped by 3 gang members. They beat him with brass knuckles for evicting their uncle.
The guy was in bad shape. They took him away on a stretcher

The officer I was with let me see all of the blood everywhere-very cool.
This is officer Riley. He took me for the night. We had such a blast! In the middle of the night we went code to just about everywhere (lights, speeding, no sirens because it was night)

Officer Riley has been in Caldwell his whole life so he knows just about everyone and knew exactly where to take me. He even took me to the cemetery which was pretty scary. We tried to see the midnight runner...a ghost that runs down the main path at midnight every night (but we missed him-we made it at 00:25)

We made funny noises on the PA system. I got teased because I wasn't paying attention and he helped push a car out of traffic. I thought he was just talking to the guy and when I noticed and began to help push the car, the work was about finished. I also didn't turn off the car when they were "sneaking" up on an incident...but I didn't hear him tell me to. All of the officers teased me about that for the rest of the night.

We went on tons of fights. We talked to kids, elderly people, checked on store clerks and basically talked to the town's people all day. It was a good time!

I had such a good time in fact that my next day at work I contemplated becoming a police officer for Caldwell PD...that faded pretty quickly though :)

It was good to hang out with the Police. In briefing all of the guys had protein shakes and were ready to chase people down the street which is quite different from the Deputies who come into dispatch with coffee in one hand and a donut in the other. Both are great people, but it was so fun being part of the Police department again for a day.