CHANGE OF LIFE - Chapter 10

Monday morning after roll call, Willard had to report to Captain Castor.

“Sergeant O’Reilly, close the door. Sit down. I want you to tell me what happened to you yesterday on that domestic disturbance call.”

“Yes, sir. As you know my wife left me last Tuesday morning. Prior to that, we were growing apart. I don’t know when it began, but I would criticize her, say mean things, and insult her. I guess that I had it coming to me when she left.

“When we came to the house where there was a disturbance, I recognized the man. We are in the same bowling league and I had bowled against him several times. There he stood shouting insults at his wife, calling her names.  I recognized that those were the same things I had said to my wife and in that tone of voice. It was like I was seeing myself.

“Across the room his wife lay half conscious. She was bruised and bleeding. He had worked her over something terrible. I felt like beating the blue blazes out of him, but I didn’t. I handcuffed him, told him that I was arresting him for aggravated assault, and read him his Miranda rights.

“I took him out to the patrol car and put him in the back seat. Patrolman Colvin had called for an ambulance and was with the wife. He kept talking like we were buddies, and that men had to stick together. After I put him into the back seat of the patrol car, and stood up, the grief of losing Dolores really hit me hard. Somehow, mixed with my revulsion at how badly beaten the wife was, I was recognizing myself in his abusive language. When it all combined, it was like an explosion inside of me. I disgorged everything in my stomach, and staggered to the steps where I bawled like a baby. I couldn’t help myself. I’ve never done anything like that in my whole life.”

“I believe you, Sergeant. You’ve heard that old saying, ‘Every dog is entitled to one bite.’  No harm was done. You arrested the attacker, handcuffed him, and put him in the patrol car before you allowed yourself to release your emotions. I’m not going to refer you to counseling. This is not going on your record even as verbal counseling. I’m going to let you be the judge. If you need counseling, then you go on your own volition. If you need time off, now or later, to deal with this, to get away, take some leave time. You are a good officer. I respect you. I’m proud to have you in my command.”

Willard knew that he had been given a pass.

In the patrol car, the air was frigid between him and Ginger. As they pulled out on the highway, he saw a pickup truck with two men and bearing Texas license. Mud was smeared over the license so that he couldn’t make out the numbers. He turned on his blue lights and pulled up close behind the truck. The truck neither slowed down nor speeded up.  He used his loudspeaker, “SLOW DOWN! PULL OVER TO THE SIDE OF THE ROAD,  AND STOP!”   The truck continued at the same pace.  He repeated his message. He called to the dispatcher and asked him to call the County Sheriff’s department and the State Police. He asked permission to continue to pursue until a County or State Police joined pursuit.

“The Lieutenant says to continue to tail the truck, but do not attempt to stop it on your own. If it is the smugglers, they are heavily armed.”

He continued to tail the truck. It seemed to ignore him.

Ginger said, “We really should not have begun this pursuit. Our patrol area is within the town of Prattsville.”

After a while a State Police car joined them. The State Police trooper pulled alongside the truck and motioned it to pull over. Eventually it did. The State Policeman pulled in front of the truck, Willard pulled in behind. With his loudspeaker he told the driver to turn off the engine. The driver ignored him and kept the motor running.

Ginger said, “Maybe he is Mexican and doesn’t understand English.”

The trooper was walking toward the driver’s side of the truck. Willard got out, pulled his pistol and was covering the trooper. Suddenly the truck roared back, slammed into Willard’s patrol car, cut sharply to the left and roared out into the stream of traffic. Willard had jumped to keep from getting crushed between the truck and the patrol car. The trooper was directly in the path of the truck and had to leap for the side of the road. The truck had pulled right into the path of an oncoming car in that lane. Willard could not fire because of the danger of hitting the oncoming car.

He told Ginger to call the dispatcher and report what had happened. He ran over to the trooper to see if he was hurt. He helped the trooper stand up. The trooper couldn’t put weight on his right foot. He thought the bumper of the truck grazed his foot as he was leaping out of the way. Willard helped him sit sideways on the seat of his car and found a blanket to put around him. The trooper was starting to feel pain and was showing signs of shock. Willard ran back to his car and told Ginger to call for an ambulance.

The dispatcher said that the ambulance was out of the County and asked if they could transport the trooper. Ginger came up and told Willard.

“Pull our patrol car up alongside. I’ll help him get into the passenger side of our patrol car. Then I’ll drive his car behind you to the hospital. Call the dispatcher and tell him what we are doing. When you get to the hospital, drive right up into the emergency entrance. Turn on your siren, and don’t waste time. I don’t like his looks.”

They raced back to town. As Ginger was pulling into the Emergency entrance, Willard stopped, jumped out of the trooper’s car, ran into the Emergency Room.

“We need some help out here. Bring a gurney. A State Policeman is injured. I think he has gone into shock.”

Willard got out of the way while a nurse and an aide ran outside with a gurney. They lifted the trooper out of the car and onto the gurney. Willard followed them inside. A woman doctor, so short she didn’t come up to his shoulder, asked him what had happened.

“We had stopped a truck out on the highway. The trooper was approaching the driver’s side.  I was standing behind the truck to cover him. Suddenly, the truck roared backwards slamming into my patrol car. Then it cut sharply to the left and leapt forward into approaching traffic. The trooper jumped toward the side of the highway, out of the truck’s way. When I went to help him up, he couldn’t put weight on his right foot. He said that he thought that the bumper of the truck caught his foot. I helped him get to the seat of his car to sit down. By then his face was ashen and he was starting to sweat. I got a blanket and put around him.”

“Did you call an ambulance?”

“Yes, but they said it was out of the County and asked if we could transport him.”

“Thank you. They are getting him stable now. Later, we will x-ray his foot. Have you notified his family?”

“I’ll do that.”

He followed Ginger back to the station. When he exited the State Police car, he locked it, went around and tested that every door was locked, and took the keys inside and entrusted them to the Desk Sergeant.

From the station, he called the State Police headquarters. He informed them of what had happened, that their trooper was in the Emergency Room, and his car was parked here at the station. He said that things had happened so fast that he never even got the trooper’s name. The trooper’s family had not been notified as far as he knew. He went by the dispatcher’s room and asked if they had heard whether any other police units were in pursuit of the truck.

“I passed the information on to the County dispatcher and the State Police dispatcher. I haven’t heard any more.”

After he wrote up the report, he found Ginger and they went out on patrol again.

At the end of the shift he stopped at the hospital Emergency Room to ask about the trooper. Anyhow, he needed the trooper’s name to finish his report. He saw the doctor and asked about the trooper.

“He had more than a sprained ankle. He had had an impact on that leg that caused a nasty break up and down the bone. You are very lucky that in transporting him you did not cause more damage or even sever an artery. You did what you were told to do, but it could have ended much worse than it did. As it is, he is in serious, but stable condition.”