May 25, 2006

Viva el Presidente!

          As you know, yesterday, Mexican president Vicente Fox came to our fair city.  Doc and I were the designated counter-snipers in the apple orchard where el Presidente spoke to a crowd of adoring (carefully screened and selected) fans.  Before we took off to the location, I got a latte' and bought Doc what he wanted- a green tea.  I was hoping that no one saw me get the tea; I mean, come on... lattes are liberal enough... throw in a green tea and people will think I voted for Dean.  Drinks in hand, we went to our site. 

          Doc and I arrived and set out to check in with the Secret Service agent in charge.  Afterwards, Doc walked back to a pile of bins and retrieved his green tea from behind a box where he had stashed it before meeting the agent.  I guess Doc thought he would be put on their "No-Fly Watch List" if discovered drinking green tea by the Secret Service during a Republican administration.  Green tea in hand, we then tackled the problem of how to get up onto the 38-foot warehouse roof which overlooked the orchards and a podium where Presidente Fox and a few dignitaries (including Washington Governor Chrissy G.) would speak. 

          The warehouse had a smaller building on one side, so we decided to get onto the small roof, then from there use another ladder to get onto the main roof.  We called the local (and remained unnamed) fire department, who came and set up the ladders for us.  We then packed all our stuff onto the roof; rifles, binoculars, lunch boxes... then climbed up for the long sentry duty.  While on the roof, we entertained ourselves by laser ranging the distances to ground squirrels that popped out onto rocks between 78.7 and 542.5 yards away.  We also wiled away some time by throwing hunks of tar down onto the reaction force car (the reaction force is a marked police Tahoe with four fellow SWAT guys; all geared up and ready to attack the forces of Al-Qaida, Communists, or green tea-drinking Dean supporters); they are supposed to stay out of sight and not bring any attention to themselves, which makes them the perfect tar-ball target. 

          Once the caravan arrived, Presidente Fox was supposed to walk over to a guy on a ladder pruning a tree, demonstrating the sort of jobs "guest workers" do in the U.S. of A.  The only problem is that they stuck this poor slob out there about three hours before Senior Fox arrived, and did not tell him when Fox was coming.  Every time a car would crest the hill, the worker would start pruning.  By the time Fox (followed by secret security, media and sycophants) arrived, el Presidente ended up looking at a tree which now only had the trunk and 1/2 a branch.  This was followed by a speech and the usual hand shaking and picture taking.

          After all the important people had left, we started taking down our equipment.  We had most of our stuff, including Doc's $7000.00 sniper rifle on the lower roof when the fire guys arrived to get their ladders.  Two of them climbed up to the lower roof, and walked over to the second ladder.  One of the fire dudes walked right into Doc's rifle and tripped over it, kicking it about three feet over the roof.  I'm sure the only reason the guy did not fly off the roof is 'cause there were still several media outlets there, and Doc is camera shy. 

          Most everything turned out OK;  the commies did not attack, Doc's rifle is fine and el presidente did not see Doc drinking green tea.  That last one is the one that had me worried; a foreign leader seeing highly trained American security forces, sipping green tea, will likely see us as an easy target for invasion; perhaps they already do.

http://www.yakimaherald.com/page/dis/286173373891053

May 20, 2006

Training Day

          Today was our monthly training day for detectives and the Gang squad.  Specifically, we had firearms and defensive tactics training.  I’m sure that most of you will understand “firearms,” however “defensive tactics” may be a bit obscure.  Defensive tactics is, quite frankly, fighting.  It does seem much kinder and gentler to say, “I’m going to defensive tactics training,” rather than, “I’m going to learn how to beat the crap out of criminals.”  When you are at court defending yourself for having had to break, say, someone’s ribs because they took a swing at you, you just look at the jury with big, doe eyes and say apologetically, “I had to use defensive tactics,” i.e. the other guy used offensive tactics.  Granted, DT is fighting in such a way as to lessen the chance of injury to a suspect or yourself. 

          Anyway, I first went to the firearms portion.  Our range is actually on a nearby military base; it is pretty desolate there and today it was hot (97 F was the high).  I did say it was desolate, but there was still some interesting wildlife that wandered in.  Krycky!  Would you look at the size of this ripper!

Then Firearms Instructor, Officer Mike, showed us the specific drill we were going to shoot today.  We call Mike "The Troll", because he is only about 4 feet tall, eats rocks, and lives under a bridge.  Right now I think he is aiming at my kneecaps.

Here we have Officer Miller (aka Paris Hilton) taking a few pointers from the Range Master, Rod "Josie Wales" Y. 

The Gang Squad posed for a photo.  Gang Squad... isn't that a syntactical redundancy?  Sort of like, "Group Club" or "Attorney Misconduct." 

Here is detective Bru; wearing some hat he bought down in Mexico on a drunken binge.  He has been hammered with a bunch of embezzlement cases this month; he is getting so tired of the embezzlers, I think he is passing around an initiative to subject them to the death penalty.

By the way, all that Diet Pepsi I drink on the range made my teeth float, got to run to the military-style latrine quansit hut. 

Well... maybe I could hold it till I got back to the next course of instruction. I think that was a dead mouse in all that, er, well... liquid. 

So- after firearms, we all went off to a boxing club in town.  There we met up (after a trip to the restroom) with DT instructor Sgt Chad.  Here is Chad being comforted by Detective Mendoza.  I think Chad just learned that there we be no goulash for dinner; that's right, Chad is one of those Nordic guys who like to compete in various competitions like, how many Volkswagons can you lift and toss through 3rd story windows, or who is fastest at removing the opponents organs while smashing in their face in a cage match.  During lunch Chad asked if he could show me this "Reallly cool medicine ball workout".  15 minutes later my triceps were both crying for mommy.  Lesson learned: Don't think you can out-workout a guy who takes voice lessons to actually sound like Governer Arnold.

Who says cops are not sensitive? 

Finally, here are Officers Paris and Lee wrestling on the ground in a blatant violation of the department's sexual harassment policy. 

Hey Remo... she's got that left elbow a bit low for the LVNR, eh?  Lee seems to like it, though.

See you all later; thanks for looking.

Dave

May 13, 2006

Wigs and Arabs

     Yesterday my kid told me that he needed a wig for a production he is doing in his TV/Video class.  He told me, “Dad, what happened to the wig you had?”  Good question... I don’t remember.  However I do remember when I got it. 

 

     In 1992 I was placed on the department’s SCAT unit.  SCAT stands for Street Crime Abatement Team; however here is the Webster’s definition:

SCAT: Function: noun.  Etymology: perhaps from Greek skat-, skOr.  Excrement: an animal fecal dropping.

Anyway, there I was with the high-speed, low drag members of the department, looking to prove myself.  My first attempts at undercover were chronicled in “Just No Good With Hookers” found here:

 

http://journals.aol.com/krisndave83/DeadInvestigations/entries/784 

 

     After that difficulty, I tried the narcotic buy thing.  First I went to the Salvation Army and found a long, black wig that I trimmed to a “Joe Dirt” mullet.  Then I threw on a leather jacket and some smelly jeans.  On my very first try, I walked to the front of a tavern, known for drug sales.  I was approached by an older man, who asked me something I couldn't understand.  He kept repeating his words and I kept saying, “What?”  He started to get mad at me, upset that I did not understand him.  He rolled his eyes, slowed his speech, as if he was speaking to a third-grader, and I finally understood him to be saying, “Do- you- want- coke?” 

 

     I had trouble understanding him because it turned out that the guy was a Turkish national.  Come to think of it, this could lead to some vacation time!  Check it out- my first undercover drug buy is being set up by a Muslim from Istanbul!  Maybe Homeland Security will want to fly me to Washington DC to debrief me on the incident; they could set me up at the Howard Johnsons next to the White House; I really would like to tour the place.  Anyway, once we overcame the language barrier, he told me to wait.  After a moment, a tough-looking guy with tattoos on his neck came out and asked me if I was the one who wanted coke.  I told him I was, and that I wanted $20 worth.  He asked me, “Are you a cop?”  I told him no, I was not a cop.  He then relaxed, got a sneer on his face, and told me that it was lucky I was not a cop, because he would take his knife and cut me deep, ‘cause that is what he does to cops, blah, blah, blah.  All the time he was talking, he was pouring out about a gram of white powder into a folded piece of paper. 

 

     He handed me the cocaine.  I gave him a twenty dollar bill, smiled and said, “Police, you’re under arrest!”  I grabbed one of his arms as his sneer melted into a panicked expression, and he yelled out a little “aaaaahhh!”  I ended up pulling his jacket off as he tried to run away, but just as he turned to run, my back-up, Officer Garza, arrived.  We both took him to the sidewalk and cuffed him.  A bit of a crowd had formed around us (cheap entertainment for the winos), and as I scanned the crowd, there was the Turkish guy, just standing there watching!  I had thought for sure he would have run off when the fight was on, but he didn’t.  I grabbed him and told him he was under arrest as well.  Later at the trial for conspiracy to sell narcotics, he almost got off, because his defense attorney argued that he did not speak English well enough to be a drug front-man.  He may not have spoken English well, but he was persistent, and found guilty. 

May 4, 2006

We Have A Winner!

Thanks to everyone who participated in the "Carpet Cop Corny Caption Contest".  I want you all to know that my family laughed a great deal (at my expense) while reading your comments. 

Now, the moment you have all been waiting for...

The envelope please-

(drum roll)

And the winner is:

Screamin Remo with:   "cha cha cha Chia Cop"

If this is the first time you have looked at the site, this is not what we are talking about:

Although, I hear (through various police intelligence sources) that the criminal element may be using this "Chia" technology in order to hide themselves within a suburban environment:

Well, it's something that we all need to be aware of and watch out for. 

By the way, Remo needs a prize for his winning entry.  What should that prize be?  Well, the answer is obvious!  Anyone who would think of "Chia" would absolutely die for one of these: