Editor’s note: This essay is part of “Stories from the Street,” a Police1 series featuring first-person reflections from officers across the country. These essays are about the lived experiences and moments that changed how officers think, lead and serve. If you have a story to share, we’d love to hear from you. Submit your story here.
I would like to share one memory in my career, which if it had played out differently, I could have been labeled as a racist cop in the headlines for doing nothing more than answering a call for help.
To preface this true story, I would like to tell you that during my 33-year career it was my everlasting goal to establish a positive reputation by treating all people fairly with dignity and respect. As a field training officer, I trained others to do the same.
However, this was one moment in time when the public’s perception of my partners and me as fair enforcers of the law quite literally hung in the balance, because of the unexpected actions of one angry suspect.
This is how that moment played out.
The arrest
Shortly before I retired, I responded to a violent domestic where a man had battered his wife. When he heard the words, “You’re under arrest,” he resisted energetically, trying to spin and pull away from us in the living room of his second-floor apartment. His resistance proved challenging, because the man was as powerfully built as any NFL fullback.
I decentralized him by dropping low behind him, placing my hands to his front and above his knees, then pulling his knees toward me while driving my shoulder into his upper hamstrings. This technique worked, launching him forward and upward, then down at the same time. As he landed on the floor, I quickly applied a leg lock while my partners placed him in double rear compliance, a move we had trained often. His resistance stopped as he experienced pain compliance from three officers simultaneously.
I found it necessary to connect two sets of hinged handcuffs together to bring his heavily muscled arms close enough to handcuff him. Since the man became compliant, my partner and I assisted him up and walked him out of the apartment, intending to take him to my patrol car so he could be transported to jail on charges of domestic-related battery and resisting arrest.
The second-floor apartment was in a large complex with an open-air walkway overlooking an asphalt parking lot. I had my left hand on the suspect’s heavily muscled right bicep and tricep area when he suddenly pulled away explosively.
In one motion, he nearly pulled out of my grip as he attempted to throw himself over the railing. He appeared intent on smashing headfirst onto the pavement below. My partner and I instantly realized a life was hanging in the balance, literally, but luckily we were able to hold on — for the moment, at least.
During the next few moments, this 230-pound man hung precariously over the railing upside down, seemingly seconds from falling headfirst to his death. My partner and I were using every ounce of energy we had just to maintain the status quo. Thankfully, the third officer came up from behind, grabbed my partner’s belt and my belt, and dug in his heels to keep all of us from going over the railing.
“That racist cop”
In those mid-air moments of great exertion, my arms began to give out. Suddenly a thought hit me with booming mental amplification. I pictured myself being labeled by the media as that racist cop who “threw a handcuffed Black man over a railing to his death.” I later learned that in the same moment, both of my partners had the same thought. This envisioned possible outcome added fuel to our fire.
The three of us conjured enough adrenaline-induced strength to pull this upside-down, dangling hulk of a man back over the railing.
With great relief we led the man, who became temporarily cooperative, to my squad for transport. At the door of the squad, however, he tightened up again, refusing to get in. He invited yet another physical battle.
I paused and said, “You know, we just saved your life. You don’t have to thank us, but could you just do this one thing for us in appreciation? Please, just get into the car. Please.”
He let out a breath, visibly relaxed his musculature and, cloaked in silence, slid into the molded hard-plastic back seat of my squad. I fastened the seat belt and said, “Thank you, sir.”
He never thanked us for saving his life, but from this point on he gave us no more problems. At the time, that was thanks enough for me.
I remember this call often
As all officers do, I have had many noteworthy calls to ponder in my post-retirement years. However, these desperate moments on that balcony come to mind every time I hear a bullhorn-wielding activist, politician or media member on the news accusing all law enforcement of being racist.
Those muscle-testing moments we lived through return to me, and I can’t help but think that if my partners and I had been a little less trained, a little less strong or a little less determined, that man would have fallen handcuffed, headfirst to the pavement below — and we would have been accused by some of being the racist cops who did it.
I am so glad we prevailed. Not only for that man and his family, but for us. Instead of remembering a tragic incident where a man died in our custody, bringing tragedy to his family and turmoil to our lives, I am left with the memory of my partners and me saving the life of someone who had just committed a serious act of violence but still deserved our best effort to keep him alive.
There was no praise or thanks forthcoming from activists, politicians, the media or even the man and his family for saving him from himself. But sometimes silence is the best cops can hope for after a difficult situation.
However, I would like to now say to Officer Andy Angst and Officer Jerry Leque, who were with me that day: “Thanks. I certainly couldn’t have done this without you.”
For all of you still in the life, keep fighting the good fight, because no matter what anyone says, it is a good fight.
