Passed Out
One night the dispatcher asked if there was a unit near a particular intersection. I was about three blocks away so I spoke up. The dispatcher told me a person was asleep in a truck at the intersection. People do not normally go to sleep at stoplights so I thought maybe the person was a passed out drunk.
I arrived at the intersection and sure enough there was a guy sitting in his nice white pick up truck slumped over to his left with his head leaning on the seatbelt. I started to knock on the truck window first with my hand then with my flashlight. I could see that the truck was in drive with the driver’s foot on the break. The guy looked at me for a second and then closed his eyes. I continued to knock on the side of his truck with my flashlight.
One of the other officers placed his car right in front of the truck touching it with his push bumper to keep the truck from going into oncoming traffic if the driver took his foot off of the brake.
Finally after two minutes according to the time on my in car camera the guy woke up enough to unlock his door. We reached in and got the truck in park and got the driver out. He was unsteady on his feet, I immediately patted him down and I could smell a strong odor of an alcoholic beverage coming from him. I asked him if he had been drinking and he said he had. When I asked where he told a topless bar about 30 miles away.
I had him perform the horizontal gaze nystagmus, walk and turn, and one-leg stand field sobriety evaluations. His performance on these evaluations led me to believe he was intoxicated so I placed him under arrest. During this he was polite always saying “yes sir,” he also had a tattoo on his arm that said “Navy”. I asked him if he was in the military, and he said not anymore. When I handcuffed him he asked me if I had double locked the handcuffs. Double locking handcuffs is standard procedure; it keeps the handcuffs from tightening up and makes it harder to defeat the locks. I thought that was an unusual question and told him I had and asked why he was so familiar with the procedure. I figured he had been arrested several times because of the question. He answered and told me he was going to corrections officer school.
I placed him in my patrol car and he told me he had really screwed up because he wanted to be a cop. I told him that he sure had.
I then transported him to the jail which was just a few blocks away. I told him how hard of a time we had waking him up. As we entered the jail he again said he had screwed up and said he hoped we did not make a training video out of his arrest. I couldn’t help but laugh at that comment.
Then he requested to be placed into protective custody. That is an unusual request and not something I take lightly. There is usually a reason a person is fearful of being in the general population, like they have been a snitch in the past. Anyway I told him that was not a decision I could make that we would have to tell the jail staff. Then he told me the jail Sgt’s name. I asked how he knew the jail Sgt’s name and he blurted out that he worked there. He said this in front of a couple of other prisoner’s. I told him to shut up because I did not want any other prisoner’s to hear this. It could have led to this guy being assaulted.
When we made it into the booking area the jail staff immediately recognized him. They told me they were not surprised, that they thought he had a drinking problem. I heard a couple of days later that he was no longer employed by the county.
I arrived at the intersection and sure enough there was a guy sitting in his nice white pick up truck slumped over to his left with his head leaning on the seatbelt. I started to knock on the truck window first with my hand then with my flashlight. I could see that the truck was in drive with the driver’s foot on the break. The guy looked at me for a second and then closed his eyes. I continued to knock on the side of his truck with my flashlight.
One of the other officers placed his car right in front of the truck touching it with his push bumper to keep the truck from going into oncoming traffic if the driver took his foot off of the brake.
Finally after two minutes according to the time on my in car camera the guy woke up enough to unlock his door. We reached in and got the truck in park and got the driver out. He was unsteady on his feet, I immediately patted him down and I could smell a strong odor of an alcoholic beverage coming from him. I asked him if he had been drinking and he said he had. When I asked where he told a topless bar about 30 miles away.
I had him perform the horizontal gaze nystagmus, walk and turn, and one-leg stand field sobriety evaluations. His performance on these evaluations led me to believe he was intoxicated so I placed him under arrest. During this he was polite always saying “yes sir,” he also had a tattoo on his arm that said “Navy”. I asked him if he was in the military, and he said not anymore. When I handcuffed him he asked me if I had double locked the handcuffs. Double locking handcuffs is standard procedure; it keeps the handcuffs from tightening up and makes it harder to defeat the locks. I thought that was an unusual question and told him I had and asked why he was so familiar with the procedure. I figured he had been arrested several times because of the question. He answered and told me he was going to corrections officer school.
I placed him in my patrol car and he told me he had really screwed up because he wanted to be a cop. I told him that he sure had.
I then transported him to the jail which was just a few blocks away. I told him how hard of a time we had waking him up. As we entered the jail he again said he had screwed up and said he hoped we did not make a training video out of his arrest. I couldn’t help but laugh at that comment.
Then he requested to be placed into protective custody. That is an unusual request and not something I take lightly. There is usually a reason a person is fearful of being in the general population, like they have been a snitch in the past. Anyway I told him that was not a decision I could make that we would have to tell the jail staff. Then he told me the jail Sgt’s name. I asked how he knew the jail Sgt’s name and he blurted out that he worked there. He said this in front of a couple of other prisoner’s. I told him to shut up because I did not want any other prisoner’s to hear this. It could have led to this guy being assaulted.
When we made it into the booking area the jail staff immediately recognized him. They told me they were not surprised, that they thought he had a drinking problem. I heard a couple of days later that he was no longer employed by the county.
posted by TexasCop at 03:20
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