Editor’s Note: Several months ago, Police1 began to actively seek “first person” essays from law enforcement officers – you can see some of those in recent postings from Tony Luketic, Jason Davis, and Andrew Hawkes, culled from the CopsOnline essay contest – and subsequently have received an array of compositions from our members. We’ll continue posting other top vote-getters from the essay contest as well as the writings of others such as this one from Jason Evans, a field training officer assigned to the patrol division of the Collin County Sheriffs Office in the Dallas/Fort Worth area. If you would like to tell a personal account on Police1, just send us an email.
By Jason Evans
I became a police officer nearly fifteen years ago and since the day that I first pinned on the badge of justice my life has been significantly different. I’m sure that other men and women who have chosen the same career path as I have feel unerringly the same way. I have had the great opportunity of working in many different areas in law enforcement. In the past fifteen years I have been a patrol officer, a K9 officer, an undercover narcotics investigator, a patrol and narcotics supervisor, SWAT officer, and I am currently back in the patrol division as a field training officer.
The first day that I sat in a police car, I was scared to death – I didn’t know what to expect and I had butterflies from my ass to my throat. I went through a strict and somewhat structured training program. I could go into detail about it but I don’t feel like telling everyone how many stupid mistakes I made or how I was made to feel like a dumb-ass on a daily basis. I couldn’t wait to climb into that Dodge Diplomat everyday with my FTO, but as soon as I was there I was nervous as hell.
Years later, when I became an FTO, I learned that everyone who sits in that seat for their first day makes the same mistakes that I made. I sit back and laugh (to myself, mostly), thinking of how I did the very same things. Well, some of the things.
As months passed and I made it out of my training I was released and given the keys to a brand new 1995 Crown Victoria. I had graduated from the passenger seat of the Dodge to the driver’s seat of the Ford and I was glad to be there. It took a while for everything to sink in. I was riding around on patrol one day and suddenly it hit me, I’m a cop and I can arrest people! I loved being a rookie cop and everyone reminded me on a daily basis for an entire year that that’s all I was. I was quickly given the name “rook,” and that was my name no matter where we were or what we were doing. A rookie has to earn his/her spot and the right to be called by their real name.
I understood the process and I worked hard to earn my spot and the respect of my colleagues, comrades, and fellow rookies. I read the penal code, traffic law, and code of criminal procedure as often as I could. The first FTO I had always told me that knowing the small things in the laws would help me the most, and as it turns out, it always has. I couldn’t imagine citing someone for the charge of ‘walking on roadway when sidewalk provided’ let alone arresting someone for it, but when you need a desperately need charge, the best ones to know are the small ones.
All at once it seemed like weeks turned to months and months turned to years. Time had passed and after about five years I felt like I was a seasoned officer and that knew it all. I remember driving around in my car one day, thinking to myself that I could handle anything thrown at me. Twenty minutes later, I was calling for help from a supervisor.
Law enforcement is one profession that is always different, nothing is ever the same and every day you learn something new, if you don’t then your probably one of the officers that no one wants to be around. During my years I also learned that some people who wear the badge, by all means shouldn’t be allowed to. I guess that no matter how meticulous you are in the hiring process some people always seem to slip through the cracks. I really don’t care to discuss this type of officer right now, I’ll just get pissed off and begin to ramble on about the idiots.
One day I was in a training class called Critical Incident Command I started thinking and after several years, my job really started to sink in with me. As the instructor was teaching, he began trying to define a critical incident. It was that moment that it really hit me and I thought to myself that we as patrol officers are involved in critical incidents on a regular basis. Depending on what your definition for that term is, it could obviously be different for each person, something that might not affect some people may seriously affect others.
Police work can acutely affect a person’s character, demeanor, and outlook on life. I understand that some guys in blue go bad. That is to say that they go to the other side and most the time it’s the ones I spoke about above. It’s the lazy do nothing guy that does his best to get out of a report, the kind of guy that no one wants to back them up on a call. It seems to me that no matter how long some people are on the job they never earn their spot and the only names they are called are ones I don’t care to refer to here. We all know who I’m talking about, every single one of us works with at least a few of them.
We as police officers see so many hideous and terrible things over time that it begins to take a toll and before you even realize it, your outlook on life has been dramatically changed. I have been unfortunate enough to have been involved in an on duty shooting. I have been in countless fights and a few have been bad ones. I have seen death in every way that it comes. We have all seen gunshot victims, people hanging, men, women and children completely torn apart in vehicle accidents, rotting corpses, stabbings, decapitated bodies, drownings and severe beatings.
If you can die from it, we’ve seen it. We’ve seen unfortunate children neglected, beaten, abused and sexually assaulted in every way you can imagine. We’ve watched people slowly ruin their lives over drug abuse and at the same time watched the dope dealers get rich and get out of jail before the day is over. If we leave a call where a three year old child has been assaulted or abused, if we leave a call where a young kid has just shot himself are we suppose to act as if we’re not affected by it? No one wants to show weakness to their brothers in blue. Everyone wants to pretend to be emotionless and just carry on as usual. The fact of the matter is that we are all affected by our jobs and what we do everyday whether we admit it or not.
On February 24th, 2001 a close friend and partner was shot on a traffic stop. Luckily, he survived. He is no longer on the job due to his injury but at least he’s still here. The day after this incident took place those of us that worked with him were expected to go out and conduct traffic stops as usual. I must admit though, the first car I stopped after he was shot, I found myself shaking and stuttering. I felt like a scared rookie on my first traffic stop all over again. I have been to several officers’ funerals. One of them I knew well—shot and killed in the line of duty.
We are investigated by internal affairs for almost every complaint against us; we have lawsuits filed on us and can very easily end up in court defending ourselves for simply doing our jobs. We are held to the highest of moral and ethical standards while our departments sometimes are not. We are the ones that are spat upon and cursed as most people don’t like us until they need us. Often times we are cursed, punched, kicked then threatened with lawsuits, but when these same people need help we’re the first ones they call.
Most of the decisions we make in bad situations are made in fractions of a second and almost always, someone will Monday-morning-quarterback (for months) the decisions that were made. There is simply nothing we can do to totally prepare ourselves for certain situations. I always teach recruits to expect the unexpected and be able to react when you see the unexpected. A wise man that I once trained best described it as the following: One should always expect the unexpected but when you see the unexpected you were expecting don’t stop to see if it really is the unexpected you were expecting.
When we go out with our families we’re on alert. If we see someone we’ve arrested, our defenses automatically go up, wondering if the person is going to recognize and confront us now that we’re off duty. It’s funny when you think about it, but we even look for expired registration and inspection stickers while off duty. As cops we plainly think differently than regular Joe Blow citizens, most choose to live in a sugar coated world with no care of what goes on around them. I really believe that if the average person had any clue what we did (and actually cared about it) their outlook on us would be dramatically different. The average person has no idea what we do or what we go through and at all times we are expected to act like robots, emotionless tin men.
As a youngster I often envisioned myself as a police officer and thought people would always look at me just as I looked at police officers as a child. I wanted to be a hero, just as I thought they were. Unfortunately, times have changed and more often than not, we are looked down upon and disrespected. For some, being a cop is a childhood dream but for others is just a career choice that’s made later in life. It takes a lot to be a cop – and I mean a real cop, one that does the job well, not just a person wearing the badge that goes from call to call.
At the end of the training course, I asked myself one question, what would I define as being a critical incident? The answer for me is simple: being a cop is one critical incident after another. We have to find a way to deal with our emotions, find that one person we trust and can talk to. The divorce rate is about as high as it can get for police officers and alcoholism, hypertension and heart disease isn’t far behind. We suffer high levels of anxiety and manage to keep on going no matter how bad it gets. I can almost guarantee that a large percentage of us can easily be diagnosed with post traumatic stress disorder, if we were to see a doctor that is.
The most important thing is to leave work at work. No matter what, don’t bring it home or I can almost guarantee that you’ll end up divorced, an alcoholic or both. Those of us that wear the badge – and are cops in the true meaning of the word – paid a price. We paid as rookies and we’re still paying today. We’ve earned our spot and we do this job because we love it, the good, the bad, and everything that comes with it.
We are all critical incident commanders.
