I went on a ride along last night with a local PD that I am in backgrounds with. It was raining pretty much all night.
I got there at 1800 hours and the Sgt. brought me in to sit in briefing. I have been in a few different briefings with a few different departments. I really liked the overall feel of the people and supervisors working for the department. I really hope that I am able to make it through the process and work for them.
The first hour of the night was spent writing a narcotics sale report. I pretty much just sat there while the officer wrote out his narrative. The sergeant stuck his head in at one point, smiled at me and said, "Welcome to policework!"
After we finished his paperwork we got out on the streets. There really wasn't much happening as everyone was inside staying out of the rain.
We stopped a bicycle for an infraction at about 2200 hours. We had dispatch run him for warrants. It came back that he was on parole and he was wanted for some kind of misdemeanor parole violation. We arrested him, took him back to the station and then transported him to the county jail. That part was pretty interesting as I had never been in the intake center of the county jail before. I looked around for anyone I knew from the aademy, but I didn't recognize anyone. The Sheriff's Department is a huge agency.
A little side story, the officer I was with went to thank another officer for letting him into this gate we were going through. So he walks up to him and says, "Thanks dude!" As the "officer" turns around he notices the double bars on his shirt and says, "Uhhh...captain." The captain just laughed. The officer turned to me and mouths, "Oops!"
At about midnight we did a patrol check of a neighborhood known for its drug activity. As we rounded the corner a guy in dark clothing took off from us. By the time we pulled around the corner he was nowhere in sight and a few people were just standing there staring at us. He told me that unless you went out on foot, you have no chance of catching those guys.
Later, we did a bar check on a local pub. As we were leaving one of the bouncers walked up to us and told us there was a girl driving away who had been drinking. So the other unit we were with pulled her over for a traffic violation and proceeded to do a field sobriety test. The officer who was conducting the FST was a rookie and I felt really bad for him as the girl was really beligerent and was having none of it. She refused the FST and he was forced to arrest her after he gave kind of a panicked look to his training officer. She was yelling at him the whole time. "You know this is wrong. How do you sleep knowing what you do to people?" Finally the experienced officer stepped in and told her that she was the one who chose to drive drunk and that she should just keep her mouth shut. I can imagine it is hard being a rookie. You want to be nice to people and be professional like you are trained to do and you are not sure quite yet how to handle people like this. I am not as young as he is, so maybe I will have an easier time, maybe not. We will see.
That was it. I am guessing this will be my last ride along before I actually get hired. The background investigator told me he was hoping to get me hired in January. I am crossing my fingers.
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