I got a little reminder in basic police wisdom today. I hear a call go out that a man is holding a gun to a child's head. The first thing that popped into my mind is a crazed lunatic holding a child hostage with a pistol to the head. I'm many miles away but I felt it prudent to head that way. I looked at the computer looking for the call and find another call at the same location. Well I click on the first call so I can read the map. Had I bothered to look at the other call slip I'd have seen an off duty officer was calling in with robbery suspects at gunpoint. To be fair I was driving so it wasn't really prudent to go reading all the call slips while rushing down the freeway! Turns out that "child" just robbed someone and happened to get caught by an off duty officer. Just a reminder what dispatch says isn't always the situation you're facing!


An officer is riding through a hood apartment complex when he finds a stolen car. As he is recovering it he hears several gunshots then sees a group of people running past him. A search of the area turns up a gunshot victim outside an apartment that is occupied by dope dealers and dope heads. He gets taken to the hospital. As we're holding the scene there is a crowd of people standing outside the trouble apartment talking amongst themselves. No doubt they are talking about the shooting. No doubt they know who and why the shooting took place but they will never tell us. A woman drives by us in a car and mumbles "it all started where those people are standing" and keeps going. She's trying to give us a hint and help us out but can't be seen talking to us. She has to live there. Poor woman.