It’s the job of cops to deal with interesting and dangerous people. Sometimes those people are even other cops. Police officers or law enforcers of Reddit shared their most memorable experiences, and these are the most interesting ones!
Check out the source link at the end to read more.
I watched a crash happen right in front of me while I was on patrol. Six vehicles, blocking four lanes. It was actually pretty bad. I walked up to one woman on her cell phone right as she got out of her car. “Ma’am, are you hurt?” She replied, “I’m on the phone with 911!” To which I replied, “I am 911!”
2BlueZebras
I stopped a driver for not having license plates. “Ma’am, I need to see your driver’s license.” “I have an ID.” “…Okay? An ID is not a driver’s license.” She didn’t have a driver’s license.
2BlueZebras
I was driving along the freeway around early evening and spotted a van parked on the shoulder. So I pulled up behind it and threw on my rear emergency lights to check on the vehicle.
I get out and start my approach and I can see the driver in the side view mirror. He’s a young male dressed in business casual attire texting on a cell phone and it looks like he’s alone. Ok cool, he probably just pulled over to send a text. I’ll just make sure he isn’t having vehicle problems and thank him for not texting while driving. It’s getting dark out and we’re in a remote area of the freeway where nothing is around except trees. I make it up to the driver’s window and he is completely oblivious to my presence, so I knock on the window lightly to get his attention.
I’ve startled people before and usually they just jump a little. This guy goes into full freak-out mode. He lets out a blood curdling scream, throwing his cell phone into the passenger seat while clutching his chest and staring at me wide-eyed with fear. As soon as the uniform registers in his head he immediately begins laughing hysterically. He’s laughing so hard he can barely breathe and talking is out of the question. I’m standing there wondering what is wrong with this guy.
He rolls down the window and he’s able to calm down enough to say something. The first words he says to me are “I have a dead body in the back.” What the hell. [Continued…]
I blurt out “You have a dead body in your van?!” while I glance over his shoulder and I can now see a body bag that appears to be full in the rear of the van. He clarifies “Oh no, it’s okay. I’m a funeral home director.” I tell him that he should probably lead with that instead of the dead body statement in the future.
He then tells me why he freaked out so bad. He explains that he is transporting this body to another funeral home for the family of the deceased. The family happens to be superstitious and had been texting him non-stop asking if their loved one was going to come back as a spirit and haunt their house. Finally, he decided to pull over in a quiet spot and read the text messages. As he is parked on the side of the road alone with the dead guy, he starts to send a reply to reassure the family that he’d been in the business a long time and they had nothing to fear from the dead haunting the living and then I knock on the window.
We both had a good chuckle about it.
wacopper
I, a federal officer, was part of a joint task force working the Intracoastal Waterway (ICW) in a southern state. It runs through remote areas and at night is rarely trafficked except by fishing boats and bad guys. So I’m onboard a State Wildlife boat.
We see a vessel in the reeds doing some fishing, so we stop to check him out, make sure he’s not moving drugs (popular in the area). I go to work checking his gear, permits, safety equipment, while the Wildlife guy chats him up. My job was done quickly: he was using illegal gear, had no permits, and no safety equipment. He was basically scooping up every fish and keeping it, a huge problem that depletes all of the fish in that area. So I have to write him up for safety violations, no permits, illegal gear, etc. Each one was a $1000 fine minimum. Because he had no safety equipment (life jacket, strobe light, fire extinguisher) I had to order him back to port. Which was a dock about 50 feet away. He was just like “awww mannnn, I’m so sorry… I’ll get this fixed up so I’m not breakin any laws, sir.” Like I said, polite to a T. Which I had never experienced, especially after handing out that many fines.
We make sure he goes home, then depart. The Wildlife guy then tells me: “that guy is infamous around here. Nice dude, always gets violated, comes back out. His grandfather did the same thing, once, about 30 years ago. Except that when a solo officer was onboard his boat attempting to give him his fines, grandpa attacked the officer, and pushed him overboard then started beating him in the head with an oar to drown him. The officer shot grandpa dead, from the water. Thankfully grandson isn’t like grandpa!”
Me: “I’m glad you didn’t tell me that until after the boarding.”
YourWebcamIsOn
As silly as this sounds, I was clearing a house (with my gun out obviously) and rounded a corner to see a man pointing a gun right at my face. I yelled and was taking slack out of the trigger when I realized I was looking at a full length mirror. Took a while to recover from that adrenaline dump. That’s a good illustration of how the human mind can’t process an entire scene at one time and you’ll focus on what’s important (the barrel of a gun) vs other details (my own face and police uniform.)
Viking042900
It was raining, and we had a lot of cars spinning out all over the area. One car needed help getting turned around to face the right direction; he spun out onto the shoulder around a blind curve. Once he was righted, he told me, “There’s something on the road that’s making it really slippery.” I replied, “Yes sir. It’s called water.”
2BlueZebras
I stopped a driver for reading a book while driving. I walked up, and just threw my arms up as in, “What are you thinking?!”
Driver: I know, I know, I can’t do that.
2BlueZebras
I was a fresh officer with dreams being a hero. I get dispatched to a call of a family fight. Brother and sister. The female was reporting the male had attacked her. I arrived and located a female and male. The male I knew from prior contacts. I detained him in handcuffs and quickly smelled the strong odour of pepper spray. I found out that after the male knocked off the females weave she pepper sprayed him. I knew there were different types of pepper spray, like gel.
I’m walking around the house taking photos for my investigation and assessing the property damage. I noticed that in his room the odour from the pepper spray was extremely strong and made my eyes instantly water with a decent amount of stinging sensation. The fumes made it incredibly hard to breath and left me without the ability to breath at points, requiring that I leave the room to get fresh air. I find a brownish gel substance all over the walls in the shape of handprints. I photograph it and determine that it was the pepper gel that male suspect was wiping off of his face onto the wall. I found it odd that it was all over the walls and covered the room. I thought this chick dusted him with the entire can of pepper gel.
After some investigation I took the male to jail.
I responded to the same house several days after for an unrelated medical issue. There were more family members at the house and the male was still in custody. I was having a conversation with the family as the hero firefighters were saving the day. I inquired if they had fully cleaned up the pepper spray from the male’s room. They gave me a strange look and told me there was none in there… [Continued…]
I told them about the pepper spray gel that was on the wall. I then sat there in horror as they explained to me this man had been, for years, masturbating on his walls and playing with it. And the gel was in fact old semen.
The fumes were the pungent smell of this man’s semen room… My gosh.
SwagyY0L0
I was dispatched to a burglar alarm to a front office of an apartment complex.I arrived then dispatch notified it was false through the alarm company. My Fto and I said screw it lets go around neighbourhood and make sure everything is good.
I noticed three ten year olds playing with electric remote controlled cars. We turned on our lights Just to show them and meet them. We asked if they wanted to race just for fun and they said we can’t. I asked why and they said one remote controls both cars and we think they are broke. I took a look and noticed they had frequency settings, both were set on same, so after a couple of minutes I figured it out and got both of them to work independently. THEY were soooooo ecstatic. It was an awesome feeling helping them out in a neighbourhood where they are taught to not like pd. I asked where they lived and out of no where he says I wish you guys loved near us cuz I’m scared when I sleep…
Long story short, you bet I am going to spend as much time in that area as I can.
It broke my heart.
Thinblue231987
My friend was catching speeders at a school zone one morning when a Red dodge Charger was doing 47 in a 30 (normal speed limit is 45). My friend turned on his lights and proceeded with the traffic stop. When he approached the car he stopped the Chief of Police for the city was driving.
My friend proceeded to ticket his boss accordingly. His boss thanked him for his time, and apologized for speeding.
The next day the chief held a meeting, called up my friend and made an example of him.
The gist of his speech was, no one is above the law and not only must we police the community we must police ourselves. With that my friend was given a letter of appreciation, and an award for ticketing the chief of police…by the chief himself.
He’s relatively new this city and was worried how the chief was going react.
proROKexpat
I was on patrol, merging onto the freeway in moderate traffic, when I spotted a driver in the slow lane with her cell phone in her hand and resting on her steering wheel. My state has a no cell phone law, and general distracted driving laws. It was a long on ramp, so I was able to watch her for a good 10 seconds and saw her keep the phone on the wheel the whole time. I figured she was using it for speaker phone, although holding it kind of defeats the point.
I pulled her over to have a chat about driving safety. Middle-aged woman, seemed like a typical mom.
“Good afternoon, ma’am. The reason I stopped you was for using your cell phone while driving.”
“Oh yeah, I was just showing my friend.” Wait, what?
“You were…showing your friend?” The car was empty.
“Yeah, I wanted to show my friend the city traffic.”
“…were you, using FaceTime? I don’t understand.”
“Oh no, I have headphones in so I’m good. I was filming a video. I want to show my friend how bad the city traffic is. But I have headphones in so I’m okay.” Referring to the “Hand’s Free” law. People think that means holding the phone with headphones in is okay.
I had to think about her explanation and how to get her to understand all the levels of missing the point she was demonstrating.
“Ma’am…you understand the cell phone law isn’t just to keep you from talking on the phone, right? The point of the law is so that when you’re driving, all you’re doing is driving.”
“Oh yeah, that’s why I have headphones.”
Sigh. “Driver’s license, registration, and insurance, please.”
2BlueZebras
I was on the freeway during Distracted Driving Awareness Month. Crack down on everything people do in the car that isn’t driving, with a big push on cell phones.
I was in stop and go traffic, when I heard a honk two lanes to my right. I looked over and saw a car stopped, with a few empty car lengths ahead of him while all the rest of traffic was densely packed. And what was in his right hand? A cell phone. Jackpot.
I moved in behind him and pulled him over. I got out of my car and made my approach. As I was doing so, I thought to myself, The only way this guy is getting out of the ticket is if he tells me he was checking the time.
“Good afternoon, sir. The reason I stopped you was for using your cell phone while driving.”
“Aww man, you saw that? You’ve got good eyes. I was just checking the time. The clock on this car is busted.”
He got a warning.
2BlueZebras
Had just participated in a K-9 demo for the local high school, showing off agility, attack and detection skills.
Afterwards, while standing by chatting with teachers and principal as students left, a kid wandered by and asked if he could pet the pooch… we always bring the super friendly dogs to these demos, so the handler said “sure”.
Kid walked up, bent over and pet the K-9. As he did, the dog stepped back, did his “alert” head toss, sat and looked to his handler for his treat.
Handler told the dog to “Seek”… dog stepped up, sniffed the kid’s left boot then sat and alerted again.
Kid, who had been watching all this, looked up to see all the teachers, the principal and the two of us in uniform all looking at him with varying degrees of “Really?” in our expressions…
Kid then said, “Aww… dude… he’s one of those drug dogs huh? Crap”
PirateKilt
While driving home, a call came over the radio about a missing 4yr old. I have a son who will be 4 this month – it instantly hit home. Over the next 3-4 minutes, I get all the info from the dispatcher:
- 4yr old girl reported missing, now for just under 2 hours
- Last seen by 16yr old sibling who was babysitting
- 4yr old “wanted to play at the park”, but was told to wait by sibling
- About 15mins later, sibling unable to locate 4yr old. After looking for 30mins, calls parents and fesses up.
- Parents search for another 30mins, then call 911.
During this time, my mind is racing. In my job, I see a lot of pictures I would rather not see, including of 4yr old girls. My mind goes to the worst (kidnapped?) during those few minutes of learning details. Then the location comes across: 2 blocks from where I am driving.
I let dispatch know I’m in the area on the way home and will look around. I pull up the satellite view (go go gadget Google Maps!) and look for parks. None around within a number of blocks… but then I realize there is a school close by. My kids have gone there. They love the playground, and my 4yr old has called it a “park” before. My heart starts racing as I whip a U-turn and head for the parking lot.
I hear a call for a heli come over the radio since daylight is dwindling. I park the cruiser and jump out. I don’t hear or see anything, and all I know is it’s a 4yr old girl wearing pink. I start jogging around the playground, looking in the toys and calling out if anyone can hear me. Nothing. =(
Start heading back to the car with a feeling of defeat. Crap. The bike locker. My son LOVES it – they play “cave” in there all the time. I turn around and stare at it. The door is open. I walk briskly over and step in with a gentle “Anyone in here?”
“Stop!” a small child whisper yells with a smile on her face. She’s wearing pink. Smile forms on my face too. “My animals are sleepy, you need to be quiet!” She points at the bikes and helmets, all neatly arranged (as best a 4yr old can do).
“Oh, I’m sorry!” I whisper shout. “Say darling, where is your mom or brother? Are they caring for some animals here too?” She shakes her head no and says “My mommy is working.
I radio in the name for confirmation and give my location. I stay and play with her for the few minutes it takes until a uniformed officer arrives. We exchange a bit of info and I head back to my car. I radio dispatch the basics of what happened and head home with one of the better feelings I’ve had in a long time. I usually don’t get to see kids happy after I help them, as it’s mostly behind the scenes. And I gave my 4yr old an extra-special hug when I got home.
GuidoZ