I was listening to a police scanner a couple nights ago

[Renew Deal]

And a call came in for "lacerations." I'm not a cop, so I didn't realize this was likely a code word for something other than an accident or a stabbing. Eventually the cop responds from the scene and says "suicide." The dispatcher asked him to repeat that and he said "SUICIDE." I could hear the defeat in his voice.

Cops take a lot of shit, much of it deserved, but it's an extremely difficult job. This sort of experience will take a toll on anyone with the slightest bit of humanity.

[Taverner]

1. That's why I never understood some cops' aversion to going after root causes nt

[demmiblue]

3. Not enough required education. n/t

[jobycom]

8. I don't understand.

Root causes of suicide, root causes of all crimes? :shrug:

Most cops I know wish there was more of an attempt to prevent crimes. Most did a lot of volunteer work with schools or DARE or other organizations to try to prevent kids or adults from becoming criminals. But really their job, while called crime prevention, is really crime response. When they are called, usually the crime has happened.

[proteus_lives]

11. Please clarify.

[Orrex]

2. Cops stood by while I was mugged because I didn't pay $75

[uppityperson]

9. heh

[cynatnite]

4. This kind of shit changes a person and never goes away...

It's going to affect a cop and how they do their job. The disgrace of the police as a whole is that there is no real attempt in giving cops mental health care...not just after the fact, but also good preventitive mental health care.

They never prepare you for the worst. I was told this by more than one cop when I worked in the ER.

[Renew Deal]

5. I agree

The few cops that can handle it are the ones promoted in the department. Most can't handle the move.

[nadinbrzezinski]

12. A relative of mine was a Police Psychologist

they tried, he tried, but some officers didn't want the help either.

And yes it stays with you... it changes you...

[niceypoo]

6. I work with a former cop and he is a Limbaugh robot...BUT

some of the stories he has told me are fascinating. He says that being a cop will make you very cynical because you tend to see the bad side of everything. When I asked him why some cops are such total assholes, he said that "everyone knew who the bad cops were and you just stayed away from them". He told of a corporate secretary he arrested buying street drugs, then seeing her evolve into a homeless, toothless, drugged out street hooker over a couple years time. He is a really good guy on most things, just very right wing republican when it comes to anything political.

He has a Rush Limbaugh mouse pad at his workstation. :o :o

[jobycom]

7. Hang out with a bunch of cops for a couple of years, you'll change your opinion of them.

Some for the better, some for the worse. One cop had a six month old baby die in his arms while her mother screamed at him to save her. Same guy pulled someone over for a traffic ticket and spent the next ten minutes wrestling the guy through the car window for control of a gun he had pulled on the cop. One cop shook down a john for robbing an escort and made the guy give her back her money and day planner. He told me his father used to get made when he was a rookie and would see his name in the paper for busting prostitutes on vice, since the prostitutes were just trying to make a living. Same cop lost his only son to the job--his son was a cop and was killed in a car accident chasing a speeder.

Some were assholes of the type you see in the news, but most were decent people trying not to die. And some were pure saints. They all had stories to tell about heartbreaking tragedies they just had to swallow.

One guy worked homicide, and had been present for a couple of high-profile (around here) murders, including the rape and murder of a young girl--nine, I think. For some reason one night he described finding her body, and the look on her face. Another night he told me some of the details in the confessions of Odis Toole--Henry Lee Lucas's partner, and the guy who they think killed Adam Walsh. I've never been able to tell anyone some of those details. They are the type that make you not look at anyone the same again, knowing people can do those things. You think you know what some of these serial killers are really like, from the hard-hitting and gritty films like "Silence of the Lambs," but you don't.

But yeah, it's a tough job. Most cops are pretty good people. Some are bad, and they make the news. But people really have no idea what they do.

[proteus_lives]

10. Great post.

That's the truth.

[Renew Deal]

13. Thanks for posting that.

:yourock: