The Silly season.......The Holidays........

As a Police Officer there is a big difference in our world than they are for those not involved in emergency services during the holidays. Most people look forward to it because it means there will be more days off work, and more happiness spread throughout their environment. Not for Cops....for us it means that every one who drinks, will drink significantly more, much more.....domestic violence calls go up 3 fold during the holidays, as do road rage incidents, and DWI's, common assaults and disturbances go up, about the only class of crimes that go down during the holidays is sex crimes, not really sure why. But the one area that goes up the most is suicides..... during the time from about Thanksgiving to just after New Years half of the yearly total of Suicides occur, a tenfold increase. A lot of people are in emotional pain, lonely, and sad. Broken hearts seem to become infected during the holidays and make the rest of the body sick as well ( I can relate). So tonight's blog entry will be about several different suicides that come to mind during the holiday season.

Case # 1. A little back ground info to get started. While working day shift in early December I worked a non-injury traffic accident. Upon arrival I observed that it was your fairly simple rear end type collision that occurred on a major thoroughfare. While obtaining both drivers ID's and insurance information I started speaking with the male-half of the accident around 35, whom we will call Donald, who happened to be the party at fault. He went on to tell me that his father worked for the City Works department and that he was on his way to his house,as he had been staying there since the divorce, and was supposed to have a visit with his kids. I returned to my patrol car and started writing down all of the driver info, vehicle info, a short summary, and a sketch of the accident scene and I ran the drivers and vehicles for registration and wanted information ( which is standard) and was sad to see that Donald had a felony warrant out of another jurisdiction for bad checks. I felt bad about doing it, but had no choice. I had to arrest him and tow his vehicle. Donald was upset, but understood. He had recently lost his job laying carpet and said he couldn't afford anymore tickets or the vehicle tow. Part of an officers job while towing a car is to do a complete vehicle inventory to safeguard the contents. In the process of doing so I found a small bag of marijuana and an improvised smoking device (pipe). After all was said and done I had cut him somewhat of a break. I didn't charge him for the drugs or paraphernalia ( two separate crimes), nor for his expired insurance card, or for not wearing his seat belt. I had to cite him for following too closely however, but set the court date for the first week in January, giving him about 5 weeks to take care of it.

Three days later while on day shift I, along with a couple other officer were dispatched to a residence reference to a "shot's fired" call and the report that a woman's son had been shot. While running code and responding to the incident ( I was acting SGT this day) we got additional information from the caller that said that her son was in the home and had been shot and that the shooter may still be inside. She was calling from her cell phone in the driveway. This changed the entire call, we now possibly had an active shooter in a residence with a child. All of day watch along with mutual aide from other agencies kicked in and we now had about 15 cars responding. Myself along with another officer arrived first. We paired up, and I notified dispatch that we weren't waiting and we were making entry. I was afraid that there was a child bleeding to death with a violent offender and new that once SWAT arrived everything would turn into a cluster-fuck, meaning it would take them sometime to make their plan and cold be hours before they entered.....regardless in we went. What we found really shows that calls are often dispatched much differently than they actually are. In a bedroom we found a middle age white male in bed partially covered up, his thumb from his right hand was still in the trigger well and the gun lay across his chest. blood hand trickled from his mouth, nose and eye sockets. A fist size hole was on the back of his head, marking where the shot from the .410 shotgun had exited after he had stuck the barrel in his mouth and pulled the trigger. Price is Right was playing on the television, and a half eaten hot dog on a bun lay on a paper plate on his chest. A hand written, poorly written suicide note lie on the bed next to him. Next to his wallet on the dresser a yellow copy of a traffic ticket could be seen. I picked up the ticket and read it. It was then that I realized that this was Donald, and this was the ticket I had written him a couple days before. The suicide note went on to say that he felt like a failure as a man because he couldn't find a job to pay his child support, and that his heart was broken because he seldom saw his kids and that he missed his wife. He went onto say he felt overwhelmed by his legal troubles and the financial burdens he was putting on his parents, and he was upset because he could find away to pay the impound fee to get his car out.

A horribly sad day that left me feeling guilty about doing my job.

Case # 2. A small trailer park is the scene of this next call. This trailer park was located near the Bass Tracker Marine plant, and this call takes place on Christmas eve around 9 PM.

As it was the holiday season all of the brass was off and since I was the most seasoned patrolman I was acting Sgt. again. I heard north side units dispatched to a trailer park reference to a dispute. Not a code three call, but units were responding. While en route the call was upgraded to a "shots fired" call. Several different reporting persons was reporting that gunfire could be heard inside a residents. North side had 4 cars responding and I responded from south side, and two area Sheriff's deputies were responding too. On arrival we entered the trailer park from different directions. I asked the deputies to start evacuating the trailers nearest the call. The 5 of us city officer made our approach, and one of our guys was on the swat team and had some of his gear. As we neared we could hear a woman screaming hysterically from within. I instructed the SWAT officer to deploy a couple flash bangs through a window in the kitchen area and the rest of us made a static entry. We were instantly met with chaos, and disorder. In a recliner in the center of the living room was a white male missing 90% of his head. Only the lower jaw, some teeth and part of the tongue remained. In his lap lay a 30/06 deer rifle, as well as a .357 revolver. A mountain of beer and filled the living room and kitchen. Obviously he was dead, but the screaming was coming from a back room. 3 of us advanced towards the screams to find a man in his 30's laying on a bed clutching his leg and a large pool of blood was pooling under him. He had been shot in the upper portion of the leg and was bleeding profusely. Fearing an artery had been hit we used a belt to make a makeshift tourniquet to stop the blood. In the corner of the room a little girl of about 12 had blood on her was screaming, holding her ears with her eyes shut.

Now the wrap up. Two brother had been drinking beer most of Christmas eve day. At some point they ended up in an argument and the deceased subject retrieved his two guns and set in the chair threatening to kill himself, his 12 year old daughter, and his brother. According to the surviving male and the little girl, the deceased had the .357 in his left hand and had been pulling the hammer back and letting down and periodically had been putting the gun to his head, his mouth, under his chin and aiming it at his brother, stating that he would kill anyone who tried to leave. He had a gun in each hand, and was acting like he was going to put the rifle under his chin when he almost dropped it, flinching, accidentally shooting his brother and himself at the same time. We removed tooth fragments from a fall wall 40 feet down range, and this little girl had been splattered by her fathers gore, brains, and blood.

Case #3. Most people assume that a middle aged male is the most likely candidate for suicide, and they are correct, but only by a slight margin. The second largest group to kill themselves is the elderly over the age of 70.

Christmas day 2000, about 5 pm.

I was assigned to the southwest part of town and had been on patrol for about 3 hours without answering a single call, or making a single car stop. I was listening to Christmas music on the radio and was thinking about returning to the police station for some goodies. Everyone that worked day shift had brought in something to eat and we were having a "potluck" of sorts. I could hear a slice of pecan pie calling my name. As I was pulling into a parking place at HQTRS a radio call came out. "302 1844 S. 18Th Avenue, Silver Acres Apt A-4 check the well being" A back up unit was assigned as a matter of routine. While en route dispatch provided further details stating that relatives in Ceder Rapids Iowa had been trying to call their mother for a couple of days and could not get a hold of her. The subject reportedly lived alone and did not have a car and rarely left the house. Upon arrival I realized that this was a senior independent living facility for low income elderly and disable subjects. No building manager or maintenance were on site. I noticed about a weeks worth of mail in the mail box, and a package from the USPS in front of the door. I could see some lights on through the windows and could hear the TV loudly blaring. As I knocked on the front door my partner went around to the rear and did like wise. Both of us got no response and the doors and windows were locked. I had dispatch try to locate a key holder for this property and have them respond. After about 15 minutes dispatch advised that the only key holder was in Clinton Missouri and would not be responding. Faced with no other choice I used the master key that all police officers are issued....My foot. I kicked in the front door and was quickly met with the smell of death. Without even seeing the body yet I had my back up call dispatch and have the coroner respond. In the back bathroom I found an elderly lady dressed in a christmassy night gown lying on the floor. She was obviously dead as levity had set in nicely. (levity is when all of the blood and fluids in the body react to gravity after death and pool in the lower portions in the body, causing a maroonish, bluish color along the area of the body that is closest to the ground), rigamortis had set in and left the body, and decomposition had began to set in. There were no obvious signs of foul play. On the sink in the restroom was two bottles of insulin and both were empty, along with a syringe. On the wall, written in red lipstick, was one of the saddest suicide notes I had ever seen. In short the note talked about how lonely this lady was and how much she missed her late husband. She talked about how her children had ignored her for years and that she was all alone. She stated that she was taking all of her insulin and was "going to be with Jesus".

As I helped the coroner prepare to load her into a body bag we both noticed how peaceful she looked. Both of her hand were folded up under her head and it looked like she had just gone to sleep.

Since a "key holder" wasn't responding we had the fire department come out and nail some plywood over her door. The rest of the forgotten "residents' had seen what had occurred. Feeling the weight of their sadness and loneliness the other Officer and I went to Walgreen's and bought 17 boxes of Chocolate Cherry's and left a box with each resident. For the total cost of about $20 we were able to brighten the lives of those imprisoned by their age, if ever so slightly.


To be honest there is much, much more I could write. I have seen more death, horrible death and misery, than any person should.

I will save the rest for another time....