Breaking Rank (28 page)

Rarely did anyone call the cops—until the next day. But if someone did, he'd know it. He listened for and counted accelerations and decelerations of responding police units: Alternators on the police cars whined characteristically, and it wasn't uncommon for our burglar to detect steel-on-asphalt crunches as racing police vehicles bottomed out at intersections en route to the crime scene. If a cruiser got too close he'd cut through backyards (he understood that cops didn't particularly like running or going over jagged-top fences or facing Dobermans or pit bulls). Or, if the police were right on his tail, he'd shimmy up a tree or dive under a car knowing that cops tended to look straight ahead, not up, not down. Those poor police officers in L.A. didn't know any better; they hadn't been trained properly.

My cops would be
trained.
They'd act and look like cops—but they would know how to think like a crook.

I believe citizens want their police officers to look like police officers. When they call to report a crime or a medical emergency they want a blue-uniformed cop to come running. They want to see him or her step out of a muscular black and white automobile. This traditional image is authoritative; it announces that professionals are on the scene, bringing aid and order desperately needed at a three-car fatality or a school shooting.

I don't like powder blue or baby-blue police cars. I don't like tan uniforms. I don't like police dogs named “Cuddles” or “Muffin.” I like shotguns and sniper rifles and semiautomatic sidearms and ammunition (a cut above what the bad guys are packing). These things help police officers get the job done, safely, for you. The symbols foster a desirable image of authority, even respect. When that breaks down, or when a police officer violates your rights or otherwise mistreats you it is
not
because he or she is wearing a blue uniform and driving a black-and-white. Sometimes a gun is just a gun.

*
To show his sensitivity to the Hispanic community, Hoobler had the slogan translated into
español
. The only problem being that
Su Seguridad / Nuestro Negocio
, which he had affixed to all the cars, means, according to my Latino friends, something like, “We'll give you safety if you give us money.”

CHAPTER 14

IT'S NOT ALL COPS AND ROBBERS

T
HERE WERE HALF A
million police officers in the country when I pushed a beat car. I'd be willing to bet your salary that not one of them ever had a chance to do what I did. In fact, I'd almost be willing to bet my own pension that it's never been done by any other police officer in history.

It all began with the radio operator's bored, professional voice. “Units 30 and 35-East, 11-40 OB.” She sent us to a house in the 3800 block of Menlo in East San Diego. Unit 30 was the east end ambulance, 11-40 was notification that an ambulance was possibly needed, OB meant a woman was having a baby, and 35-East was me. Thirty was on the air immediately. “Unit thirty. I'm not ready to clear College Park yet. My gurney's still . . . messed up.” He'd just delivered one of the victims of a ghastly accident down on 1-8. “Better send forty-three,” he said. Forty-three, however, was at that moment on the way to Hillside Hospital with a knifing victim. Radio wound up sending Unit 2 all the way from Balboa Park.

I acknowledged the call from Central and University, and arrived in less than two minutes. “Oh, thank God you're here, officer,” said a woman who'd run out to the curb to greet me. The mother of the pregnant woman, she spoke with a heavy Italian accent. The mama-to-be was Gina. She was lying on the sofa, her legs spread but covered with a blanket. “Italiano?” I asked, mindless of the importance of gender to her language. She was wet with sweat and her face was contorted but she replied with a smile.
“Sí, sí.”
Another woman, an aunt, hovered nearby.

I didn't know what to do. We'd had a lesson on 11-40 OB calls but I figured the ambulance drivers—regular cops in black-and-white Ford station wagons outfitted with a first aid kit, a bottle of oxygen, and a flat gurney that didn't accordion up and down—would handle this kind of
call (“11-41” meant an ambulance
is
needed). Gina let out a scream. The contractions were fixed and fast. I dashed out to the car, put out the 11-41, and zipped back inside where I shouted at the relatives to boil some water and get some sheets. Why? I have no idea. If I knew what to do I wouldn't have resorted to B-movie theatrics.

I nodded to Gina, telegraphing my intention to lift the blanket. A tiny head was pushing itself out of her. I say tiny, but it looked
massive.
I ran to the kitchen, washed my hands with Palmolive dish soap and near-scalding water, and dashed back into the living room, my hands held aloft like Dr. Kildare. I sat down between Gina's legs. She let out another scream and, just like that, delivered the precious cargo into my hands. I can't describe the feeling.

Gina, her two family members, and the newborn all wept. A bit teary myself, I wrapped the baby girl in a clean towel and put her on mama's chest. Then I began to fret.

What if I have to cut the umbilical cord? How far from the baby? How long are you supposed to wait? Suddenly I envisioned the apparition of Sgt. John Kennedy, standing before us in the classroom, announcing in his laconic Oklahoma twang, “Don't go getting any ideas about tying it off with your shoelaces and biting through it. No matter where you are in this city, you're close enough to an ER to get her there without having to cut the cord.” Just then Unit 2 pulled up.

One week later, to the day, as I was driving by Gina's house, reminiscing, I got my next 11-40 OB call. I'd considered it a once-in-a-lifetime triumph to have experienced what less than a fraction of one percent of all cops will ever get to do. But
twice? A week
and
a blocks
apart, at the
same time of day?

There was no greeting committee this time, only the now-familiar scream. I hustled up the walkway, surprised to hear a television blaring from the living room. Stretched out on the couch was a young man, barefoot and shirtless. The woman's screams could be heard halfway up the block. I knocked on the door. The guy looked up, annoyed. “Come on in,” he said when he realized it was a cop.

“You call the police?”

“Nah, my old lady did.”

“Where is she?”

“I don't know. Bedroom. Bathroom.” He was maybe twenty-five. Tall, pasty white, prison-cut. I couldn't tell if he was drunk or high as he lay there, lids half closed, staring at the television.

“I'm going back there to check her out, okay?” It sounded like but wasn't a question. There'd be no winner if the two of us got into a fight. The woman let out another scream. “She pregnant?”

“Yeah. That's the problem.” I wanted to hit him. Hard.

She was on her back on the bathroom floor. One hand was locked around the drainpipe under the sink. Her purple tie-dye maternity smock, homemade, was pulled up over her distended belly and her legs were in the customary position. “Oh, thank God!” she said when she saw me. God was getting thanked a lot that week.

“What do you think?” I said, bending down to her. “Are you ready?”

“Past ready,” she said. “Jesusfuckingchrist, I'm
past
ready already!” I took the cigarette from her mouth, snubbed it out with the others in a saucer on the back of the toilet. A can of beer sat off to the side. I gave her a pat on the arm.

“I'll be right back.” I ran through the house and out to the car—there were no walkie-talkies in those days—and got on the air. “Unit 35-East, have 30 expedite.” That was code among street cops for
fuck-policy-put-your-freaking-lights-and-siren-on-and-get-your-ass-here. Now!
I rushed back inside, stopping in front of the jerk. “That your baby?”

“She says it is, but . . .” He mumbled his doubts, something about being in the joint when she got knocked up. I turned the tube off, checked to see if he'd jump me for it. The quiet was complete.

“Do me a favor, okay?” He looked at me dumbly. I sent him on the same fool's errand. “Boil us some water, get us clean towels.” The towels I could use. He stood up, towering over me, even with my helmet on, and sauntered into the kitchen.

His woman was, indeed, past ready. I heard 30's siren shut down out front just as she pushed the baby into my hands. This one had outdoor plumbing.

It was awfully sleepy out. We were working twelve-hour shifts on P3 (eight at night till eight in the morning), something we did every other week because of the riots in Southeast San Diego. Think Watts, Newark, Detroit—on a smaller scale. I'd seen some action earlier in the shift when, along with a hundred other cops, I attached a face shield to my helmet and waded in to the throngs of rock- and bottle-throwers at Mountain View Park. Things had calmed down at about two in the morning, which was when we east-end units got sent back to our beats. The Heights regulars would be held over another several hours to maintain the uneasy peace. You never knew when a smoldering ember could flame into another fireball.

The sun was just peeking around the side of Mount Helix. I was on the Boulevard, almost at the La Mesa border, having just cleared from a call. My eyelids felt like anvils but there was no way I'd park myself in some shaded glen to catch a few Z's. I had little use for peers who dozed on the job, even the ones who claimed they could hear the radio in their sleep. When you're needed you're needed. Besides, the thought of kids on the way to school standing next to a police car, eyeballing a drooling, snoring cop . . .

I started back to my beat, still congratulating myself for having delivered those two babies the week before.
Delivered
: a lousy term of art. It was the moms who'd made the deliveries, I'd merely accepted the packages. Still, it felt pretty special . . .

I was getting sleepier. I took my helmet off, smacked myself in the face a couple of times. Only half an hour to go. Maybe another call? Something to help me honor my vows, stay awake, stay alert? Dispatcher Betty Nulton obliged. Abandoning her half-dead tone, she put out the call: “Any unit for an 11-40. Infant not breathing.” She broadcast it with the urgency of a mom. “Any unit” calls, as opposed to designating a specific car, came when there were few, or no, units showing green on the big board down at headquarters. Or when you needed the closest police car.

Three calls cause cops to drop whatever they're doing and race to the scene. An 11-99 (“officer needs help”). The report of a naked woman. Or any situation involving a sick or injured kid.