I'm a Black Jew on my way to Texas to marry the queen of Shebah

C.O.P.S. has been on television for 21 years now, always shown on the Saturday night time slot of 7:00 pm to 8:00 pm on FOX. The show is exciting, and a glimpse of incidents police have to deal with, but it is only a small sliver. People love watching it, and I must admit that I still do as well, and enjoy watching the chases and fights....it may not be good to mention this, but I loved the fights! In my 10 plus years as a cop I was involved in somewhere around a hundred fights. 95 out of 100 of those were with normal people that mostly responded to pain, at least partially. Most of them would comply to demands if they were maced, struck with a baton several times, punched a few times....but 5 out of 100 were essentially like demonic demons and truly could not be hurt regardless of what we did to them. Also they seemed to possess super human strength and remarkable endurance. Today I will talk about one of them.

I was working midnights ( 10 pm-06 am) and it was around 3 am. I had just made an arrest off of a traffic stop I had just made, the driver had a simple warrant, not big deal. As I was traveling the 5 miles to the jail I had to drive on a 4 lane divided highway. Suddenly I had to swerve out my lane because there was a pedestrian walking south band in the traffic lane. I radioed for another officer to check on the subject as I was concerned for his safety. As I arrived at the jail entrance I heard officer Bruce Stamford go out with the subject. Just as I entered the jail I heard Bruce ask dispatch to start another car routine, which means simply that he wanted a second officer there but that he didn't have to run lights and sirens as there was no direct threat to the officer yet. My "spidey sense" started to go off and I quickly handed the prisoner off to a corrections officer and proceeded down the stairwell towards my car. Suddenly on the radio I heard a high pitched voice yelling , which I couldn't understand, and I could hear a second voice in a loud but calm voice saying "show me what you got pig, is that all you've got" and silence on the radio. Now at this point on I am running down the stairs and sprint to my patrol car. Just as I start my car and activate my overhead light bar I hear Bruce calling dispatch and his voice sounds different that I have ever heard it. ( a little back ground on Bruce. I had known Bruce for about 8 years and he had been a civilian police officer for about 6 years and had spent 6 years in the Air force before that as a SP Security Police. Bruce was 5'10" and weighed 240-250 and knew how to handle himself ) "Radio I need help! 10-37 radio, 10-37! 10-37 is the police radio code that means the officer is in danger and needs immediate assistance.....or in other words, "the shit has hit the fan!"

I leave a black mark as I peel out of the parking lot and activated my sirens. As I drive through the heart of town at 100 MPH I hear other officers dispatched to Bruce's location, but they are several miles further away than I am. It seemed like an eternity to drive the 5 miles to Bruce's location but only took about 2 1/2 minutes, I pulled on the highway northbound and punched it, I was soon up to 130MPH and quickly came upon Bruce's patrol car on the opposite side of the highway. At this point my adrenaline was really pumping as dispatch couldn't raise Bruce on the radio again. As my patrol car slid to a stop I saw something that left a lump in my throat. Bruce's flashlight was on and laying in the highway and the windshield in his patrol car was shattered. I was panicking because I couldn't find Bruce when I heard a weak transmission over the radio say "keep coming north" I floored it across the median and about 1/3 of a mile north found Bruce on his hands and knee's in the highway with his gun out pointing at a massive subject that was advancing on him. I was out of the car like a bullet and got in between the obviously injured Officer Stamford and this psycho I had my mace in one hand and my flashlight in the other, Bruce yelled out a warning " be careful I can't stop him! I sprayed him with a full can of mace and punched him and split his head open with my flashlight and nothing worked" I spray this fucker with a 3 second burst of mace and without seeing if it worked smashed him in the side of the head with my flashlight which resulted in a spray of blood from his ear but did little else. This son of a bitch was fast and kicked me in the stomach and swatted my flashlight out of my hand, I pulled out my ASP Baton, ( 26 inch long collapsible night stick) and began to strike him as hard as I could swing it in the approved locations ( legs, knees arms, elbows, hands etc, etc). I have hit other people with my ASP in other situations and it never took more than 4 strikes to gain compliance. I literally hit this monster 50 plus times, and was swinging it with both hands, so hard so that I became winded, and I was in good condition then. I backed off about 20 feet from the subject, as he slowly advanced on me and said in an icy chilly voice I will never forget " now what are you going to try pig, nothing seems to be working". I was beginning to think we were fighting the devil himself! Bruce had moved from his hands and knees and was now totally prone on his belly, obviously hurt, but still had his pistol out. I attacked the bastard again with a flurry of baton strikes, this time I was chopping at his collar bones and got a really nice strike in and heard him make an audible "ugh" like he was in pain, with that I kicked him as hard as I could in the groin, and got behind him and got him in a choke hold. This guy was big enough that I literally had to jump in the air to get my arm around his throat. After about 10 seconds of riding this guy like a bull the choke hold did it's job and the subject crumpled to the ground in a heap.......but I was so exhausted from this 5 minute fight that I was afraid if I released him to cuff him and he came to that my only option would be to kill him as I did not have the energy to protect myself from another assault. As I lay on top of this guy I can hear sirens coming (nothing sounds quite as good as sirens coming when you are in need of help), within seconds officer Richard Bear is at my side tapping me on my arm telling me to let the guy go, and I refused telling him I wouldn't until he had him in handcuffs, with that he quickly cuffed the subject up. As I rolled onto my back on the shoulder of the highway, gasping for wind I noticed something, a small purple Ford Ranger Pick up sitting on the shoulder of the highway not 50 feet from us. ( more about this later, but remember it) Now there are about 8 officers there and I crawl over to Bruce....Bruce thinks his ribs are broken and has labored breathing. I call dispatch and have them send an ambulance for Bruce. The bad guy is coming to and is trying to get up but the cuffs and the beating he took are slowing him down but he is yelling so crazy gibberish. One line in particular stays with me today (10 years later).....multiple times he yelled " I'm a black Jew on my way to Texas to marry the queen of Sheba "....the odd thing is he was white. Also at this point I realize the suspect has multiple lacerations on his head that are going to require stitches, also I notice that he has blood on the front of both of his shins that is heavy enough to bleed through his jeans. I found out later that this was from my ASP strikes and that I had literally broken both of his legs but that hadn't slowed him down.

Now the wrap up.....Bruce was transported to the hospital. He had several broken ribs on his left side ( consistent with being struck by a right handed person), his lip was split bad enough to need stitches, and he had a mild concussion. Not to mention lots of bumps and bruises. Bruce later stated that when he asked the subject for his identification that the subject said to him "it's time for you to meet my father, Lucifer" and attacked Bruce and literally picked Bruce up and threw him into his patrol car ( this is how the windshield shattered). As Bruce and him fought the guy kept trying to get Bruce's gun which is on his right side, Bruce bit the subject at one point to keep from losing his gun. Bruce eventually fled from the subject ( and there is no shame in that what so ever) to keep from being killed or killing him.

The bad guy was admitted into the hospital and later transferred to the inpatient psych unit then eventually the jail. Both of his legs had numerous fractures, and his collarbone was completely broken. He had to get over 50 stitches and had a serious concussion. Now most people that fight like this people assume that they are on PCP, acid, meth, and the like.........now here is the shocker. The toxicology report showed this guy was on absolutely nothing, he was just mean and crazy. His NCIC criminal history showed something disturbing....Besides the petty crimes it showed that he had been incarcerated in an Arkansas prison where he BEAT a prison guard to death......beat him to death! Much like he wanted to do to us. He served 20 years for this crime and had been out of jail less than 6 months when we dealt with him.

Remember the purple Ford Ranger I mentioned above? This is the thing about this story that pisses me off more than anything else. The guy in the purple truck had been driving home from work when he observed Officer Stamford fighting with this demon. Instead of helping Bruce he pulled over on the side of the road and simply watched the assault. He the story gets worse....if this guy was an average citizen I would say that he should have stayed in his truck as he wouldn't be experienced with these type situations.....but he wasn't a normal citizen! This yellow coward, this worthless piece of shit was a Police Officer, a Sergeant in full uniform from another agency, Branson to be specific, and instead of coming to a brother officers aid he just watched......and it gets worse. The day after this incident he called the police chief of my agency and made a complaint against me for excessive force! My chief had some choice words for him and told him I probably saved the bad guys life because the injured officer was about to use deadly force to stop the assault. I won't say what this piece of shits full name is, but here are some clues......He is Sergeant Richard B. and lives in a suburb of Springfield.

There you go....a story about my fight with a demon from hell. Me experiencing things like this is why I am quick to defend cops that use force quickly, because you never know who is going to be the next one to be superhuman. The bottom line is if you go in to soft with one of these guys you will end up in a flag draped casket.

"Shot's fired, shot's fired, shot's fired!"

Easter Sunday 2000...I was assigned to day shift, 0530-1400 hours (2 pm). I was a little upset that I wasn't spending Easter Sunday with my little girl, Allison, whom was 4 years old at the time...but I was thankful I would get to see her that evening. I was expecting a typical Sunday day shift which meant not much more than taking a couple of reports from crimes, mostly thefts and vandalism's that happened the night before and maybe write a few traffic tickets and not much else. In other words, especially being a holiday, I was expecting a slow shift....Boy was ever wrong.

Things had been going pretty smooth when I heard an officer with not much experience dispatch to a stolen car with suspect information. I assigned myself as back up and went with him on the call. We met the "victim" whom I immediately recognized from numerous prior calls, some with her as victim some as the suspect. Regardless, she was the victim this day. She stated that her boyfriend Joshua Comp had stolen her car after they had been involved in a verbal domestic. I was very familiar with her 19 year old boyfriend, having arrested him for everything from simple traffic charges, to pursuit, to possession of heroin and cocaine. Most recently I had contact with him when he attempted suicide ( and almost succeeded).

After getting all of the complaint forms signed we responded to Joshua residence, where he resided with his parent's, to attempt to affect an arrest and recover the vehicle. The vehicle was in the drive way and the garage and was standing open, but no one was to be found. We allowed the victim to recover her car and we decided we would try to catch up with Joshua later in the day.

45 minutes later I thought I would take a pass by the house. Low and behold Joshua was in the front yard. I radioed for another car and quickly exited my patrol vehicle, as I did so Joshua ran behind and along side the house. At this point it's probably necessary to describe the house. the home was about a 50-60 year old two bedroom with an attached two car garage that faced south. The back yard was entirely fenced and had two large aggressive dogs within. The home had a basement only accessible from the outside on the east side of the home. That entrance was partially obscured by bushes.

With back up arriving, the reporting officer and a Sergeant, I began to search the grounds for the suspect. All though I had arrested Josh numerous times in the past he had never physically resisted me. I was known throughout the department for having the best officer safety skills of any of the officers who worked there....bottom line is I knew how to handle myself and took officer safety very seriously. That being said, you can't always operate in a 100% safe manner, if you could, cops wouldn't be needed.

Whom ever a call is assigned runs the show at a call, regardless of rank. The rookie officer's first mistake of the day was not assisting in the search for the suspect, instead he decided to strike up a conversation with the parents of the suspect, for several minutes. At this point I observed Josh and of course he ran from me, retreating into the darkened basement. I notified the R/O (rookie officer) that I had the suspect on the east side of the house and needed his assistance. Instead of responding as he should he decided to continue to banter with the parents. After two or three more attempts he said the "mother" of the suspect was "responding" to talk him out of the basement. I was irritated at this point but didn't say much. The Sgt, R/O, and me stood back about 30 feet from the basement entrance. The mother was able to talk him to the door. At that point I observed that Josh was in shorts and a t-shirt and didn't appear to have any weapons ( all though you could never be sure). Josh asked me if he was going to jail, I told him we had to talk about it and hear his side but that there was a good chance. I asked him to step out from the basement, he refused and started back within, and turned out the basement light.

The rookie asked what we should do, I of course was disgusted at how timid he was and said "we fucking arrest him"....I put on my black leather gloves ( something that nearly cost me my life) expecting to have to drag him out of the basement. The R/O was complaining that he was having trouble with his vision and didn't want to be the first in. During this very short time I briefly thought about a Sgt. with the St. Louis County Police department that had been recently shot and killed going down the stairs in a basement after an armed suspect, and had chosen to go to save to rookie with him, and subsequently died for this choice....but I knew this wasn't the case today, it was Easter Sunday, around noon in s small city. Down the stairs I started, the bright sun from behind me and the darkness inside were throwing me off. About the time I got to the bottom stair I sensed movement to my 1 o'clock about 15 feet away. I also heard a sound that I will never forget, the bolt closing on a .270 rifle, as he brought it up to his shoulder in a firing position. All this happened so fast, and it is hard to describe, but my adrenaline hit me like a brick wall and totally focused everything directly in front of me. As I was yelling "gun, gun!" and pulling my Glock from it's holster I saw a bright explosion, felt a concussion, and heard a tremendous blast as I fired my own pistol ( which I don't really remember hearing) as I retreated backwards. At first I thought I must have been hit but realized I was still alive so I couldn't have been. In the 2 seconds it took for this whole scenario to happen I remember thinking that I always expected to be shot or shot at but it would be from a handgun that my body armor could easily stop, not a rifle designed for large game, something that could blow a whole through my vest, me, out my back, out my vest and into the next officer behind me.

Everybody was in high adrenaline mode. The Sgt. was shoving the scumbags parents back to safety as I was yelling for the rookie to find hard cover. I called on the radio ( in a pitch like a 10 year old girl I was later told ) "302 shot's fired, shot's fired, shot's fired"...."we need help!" As I have said before in this blog I react very well under pressure and I did this day to. I immediately asked the parents if the house could be accessed from the basement, because I was afraid he could get inside and maneuver for a better shot. Fearing that I might have shot the bad guy or that more people would be hurt I called for an ambulance to stand by in the area. I also called for the SRT team to be activated, and to call the MSHP to send a negotiator. As back up arrived I started assigning cover positions. I have to admit that it was comforting to see cops from other departments showing up with M-16's and shotguns. Other officers responding I assigned them to start evacuating the surrounding homes. A trooper that showed up told me I was bleeding. I don't know when it happened, and I didn't feel it, but I had bitten my lip rather badly and had bled pretty good onto my cheek and neck, he took me aside and checked me quickly and I was happy to see that I was "OK".

Finally a negotiator talked the subject out ( with his gun for awhile), after a few minutes he put it down and surrendered.

I had missed the subject when I fired at him, but I had hit the stock of his gun and showered him with splinters.

In the basement he had a suicide note written out. In it he talked about how much he hated me and that I had ruined his life. He also said how much he wanted to kill me and that he knew where I lived ( listed my address and apartment number) and that I had a daughter and he would kill her too. After being shown this later I drug him out of his jail cell and grabbed him by the throat and told him I would kill him if I ever saw him around my home or daughter......

Highway patrol investigated the shooting. They asked me how many times I fired my weapon during the incident. I told the investigator that I thought I had only fired once. Come to find out I had actually fired 5 rounds. I was quickly realizing that adrenaline was an odd thing.

Within 48 hours of his arrest I moved....some may say I should have stood my ground. Well I wasn't really worried about me. I was worried about my daughter.

I took a couple days off and when I returned was met with slaps on the back and the like. I laughed and acted like it was all fun, but it wasn't. This incident bothered me so much I really didn't talk about it to anyone outside of work. Part of me was embarrassed over the whole thing. Going down those stairs into the home was the classic "fatal funnel" they teach you to avoid in police work. Secondly, I had missed my target. I never miss as the range and almost always am the top shooter in the department. I learned that day that moving targets with guns firing at you are much harder to hit.

Another big thing that day..... I was afraid and felt fear, and felt guilty because of it. In the years that have passed since then I have realized that all of my feelings relating to that shooting are naturally and I acted in a brave, professional, if almost typical manner. It also taught me to never take for granted that things will be peaceful....after all this literally happened noon Sunday on Easter in a town of 20,000 people.

I could probably do better writing this, but I am getting sleepy.

One last note.....the guy who tried to kill ended up getting probation and ran down an officer with a car a couple years later....and last I knew out of jail. i truly regret that I didn't hit him when I shot at him that day.