Paying attention during the most mundane tasks can pose a dilemma. When do you choose to get involved?
As was customary when I got off-duty, I gassed up my truck at a Chevron close to my West Side Station before my commute home. I had moved out of the city at this point in my career, and while loving the quality of life that living in suburbia gave me, I dreaded the 90-minute trek each way.
Being tired after a long shift, and also being a little lazy, I wore my full San Francisco police uniform while doing this, with only a thin “cover coat” over my gun belt.
I was naturally attentive to my surroundings.
As I was fueling, this extremely beat-up sedan rolls up across the island from me, and a flustered and “verbally expressive” woman gets out of the driver’s side. Her obscene invective was directed at a large male figure slumped in the passenger seat. Un-moving, he just lounged there despite repeated threats of immediate personal violence.
I waited, bemused, waiting for her fuse to reach critical mass.
Fate intervened: An outbound MUNI bus pulled up at the nearby curb, and noisily began boarding passengers.
Ms. Foul-Mouth huffed one last time, slammed the battered door loudly, and then ran onto the departing bus.
This was getting interesting.
Slouching Sam took all this drama in without any apparent notice, but finally got out of his side of the car.
He staggered several times while getting to the driver’s side of the Chevy, leaning more than once on the car during this short journey. An old beat cop like me would call this a “drunk walk.”
It took him three tries to get the gas nozzle into the car’s fuel receptacle, and even more to activate the gas dispensing buttons and levers.
Looking around then, he ambled towards some scraggily decorative weeds at the edge of the station, unzipped his stained and ragged jeans, and then proceeded to fumblingly relieve himself in their general direction while in full view of the still crowded bus shelter.
He almost fell down in the process.
I had long since finished my business there and was having an internal debate as to whether I was just going to try and prone him out in cuffs immediately by myself, or (more creatively) grab the keys from his car ignition, while waiting for my just now called on-duty back up.
I’m not sure if this guy even zipped up his pants before he pulled out a very large thumb sized marijuana blunt, and while he was still less than 6 feet away from cars pumping gas, lit it up with an industrial sized butane gas powered lighter.
I muttered some police code into my take-home radio that said basically, “Advanced Idiocy in progress, step up your response.”
Exactly at that precise moment, the left rear door to his car burst open, and two raggedly dressed but cute-as-a button little girls called out” Daddieee, we’re hungry, where’s Mommieee?”
It was time for me to take immediate action by myself it seemed.
A few quick steps towards the open car door revealed no child seats, a few tattered and soiled thin blankets, and numerous empty potato chip bags.
As I quickly reached into the foul-smelling car to grab the keys, (and do a quick visual search for obvious weapons), I saw a half dozen empty liquor bottles, fluid leaking beer cans, and a joint roach overflowing ash tray.
Next step: Stop the gas now flowing down the side of the car, grab the kids, and retreat a safe distance away from what I hoped would not become a burning crime scene soon.
Mr. Dufas was now watching this whole drama unfold in front of his glazed eyes, and he managed to shout, “Hey, what-are-you-doing man? Huh?”
I took off my cover coat, wrapped the shivering toddlers in it, and went mentally into my Private Police Place to calm down.
I thought, Don’t shoot him, too much paperwork!
Breathe.
(Also, with my luck the muzzle flash from my .357 would ignite the gas fumes, and we’d all become flaming marshmallows.)
Don’t beat him into a puddle of paste.
Again, the paperwork would be a bitch.
Breathe.
Let the now arriving cover units handcuff him, so you can’t be blamed for his well-deserved black eyes and broken fingers.
My cover cops were all seasoned veterans. They saw two small bedraggled and shivering near babies who were hugging each other while wrapped in my dark blue storm coat.
Me, stone faced, standing defiantly in front of them, with my right hand on an unsnapped duty weapon.
A very large and shaggy bear of a man, shambling towards me cursing and shouting threats.
Lead cop: “Hey Lieutenant; are you okay?”
Me: Pointing with my off hand, “GET HIM …”
I’ve always thought that the art of gang-tackling a suspect was a neglected topic in the police academy. These coppers were obviously masters of that art.
In short order Child Protective Services (CPS) was called and took the hungry, dirty, and cold children away.
Juvenile Investigators came and grabbed “Daddieee.”
My guys did a cursory inventory of the sedan, and after washing the overflow gas off of the sides, had it towed away.
(They were also very happy with the extra-large pink box from Hunts Doughnuts that magically appeared in the Squad Room just before their next scheduled coffee break.)
The station attendant who had smartly been watching this entire scenario from inside his armored booth, now came outside and handed me a freshly made large coffee with extra cream and too much sugar, as he knew I liked it.
I thanked him, and asked him how much?
He said, “I have kids at home, no charge for the coffee today Heffe.”
The coffee helped me de-jitter a bit while I was stuck in rush hour traffic.
I found out that about 45 minutes later the female half of this episode showed up at my station asking where her car, her husband, and her kids were? (In that exact order.)
The lead cop that helped me in the earlier scrimmage was still pounding away at Dad’s paperwork, and graciously invited “Momieee” inside the stations-controlled environment to “sort things out.”
Long story-happy ending:
This gal had multiple arrests from everywhere, (2) local warrants for DUI, and (even better) an extraditable Child-Abuse Felony warrant from Seattle.
Dad had a similar record and some come-hither paperwork from deep in the heart of Texas.
Bye bye…
The waifs in question were given to their great-aunt (a schoolteacher in Sacramento) who later was given full and total custody.
That night I finished my commute-coffee just as I was rolling into my driveway and saw my little girls, Jennifer and Michaila, playing on the lawn.
I hugged them carefully, but very deeply.
10-7
