This is a followup story to Case #38
Case #39 – The People vs O.S.S. (Above the law) (part 2 to Case #38)
After about 3 weeks worth of detective work, Jane Doe discovered that the windbreaker's not always greener on the other side. She pulled up stakes and jumped back into a radio car, leaving the O.S.S. spot to be filled again. Jorge Padilla got the call. Jorge was still in the Mexican version of a snit (una snita) over having been passed over for a newbie ruca in the first place. So he turned up his nose and said,
“NO WAY, JOSE!”
Cliff Jones got the nod, but Cliff had just made training officer, and wanted to see if he was as good a coach as he was a player. The list was getting slim. After a coin toss, and then another coin toss, and another, all of which came up in Mike Gomez’ favor, the Captain saw it as a sign from God, that, on the fourth attempt, the coin fell in the toilet, so he reluctantly picked up his Magic 8-ball to choose Jane Doe’s replacement.
“Ohhhh, Magic 8-ball, who shall (“should”, is not in the department’s vocabulary) I choose to be the new O.S.S. detective?”
He nervously turned the shiny black orb over and looked at the clear circle of plastic underneath. White letters slowly floated up out of the blackness, and into view, forming the cryptic answer,
“Try again later”
Exactly one hour later, the Captain nervously picked up his Magic 8 ball again. As he turned the mystical orb over and gazed reverently into the blackness, these words floated up from the inky depths;
“Anybody, but Kim”
By process of elimination, the Captain chose Mike Gomez to be the newest O.S.S. detective. Congratulations Mikey.
A few weeks after Mike joined O.S.S. and became our station’s newest detective, O.S.S. suddenly got an influx of bodies from other stations. This meant their killer workload dropped. Good news for the guys who had been working back there for so long. Bad news for Eric Ehrhorn, who should have toughed it out, just a few months more, because now he was stuck with Larry Thompson as his sergeant on the Park Enforcement Team and Larry preferred to have attractive young women on his team. Eric was still attractive, but he wasn't that young anymore... mmmmm, nope, I can't think of anything else that Larry would have considered a disqualifying factor for his "ideal" team.
On November 11, 2007, Carson High School was playing Banning High School, their traditional rivals, in a C.I.F. game. Trouble was expected;
1- because both schools have more than their fair share of feral children, unused to the ways of a decent society and,
2- because the stadium at Carson H.S, seats 3,000, but they were expecting 10,000 to show up, meaning there would be 7,000 angry, frustrated fans, most of whom have not yet even signed up for their court ordered anger management classes. Of course the problem could have been mitigated by making it a pre-event ticket sale, with no tickets sold at the door, but L.A. School officials have their own Magic 8 balls to consult with for policy decisions.
About 20 deputies were assigned to keep an eye on the perimeter neighborhoods of the school to discourage bad behavior. That same night, O.S.S. had already signed up for overtime at a Duran Duran style band concert, several miles away, at the Stub Hub Arena (or whatever it's called). Well, that night, there was a double shooting in the Leadership neighborhood, located on the south side of the Stub Hub Arena. The suspects were from the Stevenson Village neighborhood, located on the north side of the Stub Hub Arena. The arena is right in the middle of these two neighborhoods. The O.S.S. detectives did what they do, which is to go help with the investigation. They left their assigned overtime posts at the peaceful, and uneventful concert, drove about 400 yards to the Stevenson Village neighborhood and started looking for the murder suspect’s vehicle. Dave Kluth and I were reassigned from the high school to help with the murder investigation. We also drove to the Stevenson Village neighborhood.
Shortly after turning in to Stevenson Village, we saw O.S.S's Sgt. Fred Reynolds, and Detective Mark Wedel on a cul-desac. They had some people detained in a vehicle that matched the murder suspect’s vehicle (it turned out not to be). We stopped to back them up. One of the people they had detained, was a guy with enough weed for a possession for sales case. They sat him in their backseat, while they spoke to the other vehicle occupants. About six other O.S.S. detectives rolled up, including Luis Trejo, and his protégé, Mike Gomez. Detective Trejo told us where he kept his booking paperwork and asked us to fill out the paperwork. DETECTIVE Gomez started to head to the car to start the paperwork himself, but Luis stopped him by quickly grabbing his shoulder, pursing his lips and subtly shaking his head, “no”, then he nodded slightly toward us. The confused look on Mike’s face caused Luis to extrapolate further, by slightly lifting and shaking the left shoulder of Mike’s O.S.S. windbreaker, then slowly pointing at his own O.S.S. windbreaker with the other hand, then shaking his index finger in a, “no-no”, fashion, before subtly pointing his hand, palm up, at Kluth and me,while cocking his head slightly and raising an eyebrow in an, "understand?", fashion.
Mike was confused for a second, after all, he had always jumped to do things for deputies far more senior than he. Now, he realized that those days were over. HE was a DETECTIVE now, and the days of being respectful to the likes of Wayde Farrell, Mike Chacon and Dave Kluth were in the past! As soon as Luis saw the light of recognition in Mike’s eyes, he gave him a wink and a silent nod of approval. As Mike looked around at the other detectives from the O.S.S team, he saw that they had all stopped in the middle of their various detective tasks, and were all looking at him with little knowing smiles of cameraderie along with little winks, that were accompanied by thumbs ups, index finger points, or slight nods of the head, before they all turned back to what they had been doing, which was pretty much, just standing around bitching about the concert they were now missing. Mike realized how special he was. Mike gave one last look at Wayde and Dave, two deputies who he had always looked up to, then gave a dismissive snort and turned his back on them, as he and the other detectives stood around looking all detectivey in their green windbreakers and jeans.
About ten minutes later, Sgt Fred Reynolds came up and pulled Kluth aside. Dave took out a cigarette and put it to his lips, as Sgt Reynolds, surprisingly, lit it for him. Then Sgt Reynolds whispered into Kluth’s ear for several minutes. I saw Dave’s eyebrow cock as he blew a ring of smoke into the air. Then Sarge looked at Dave with a pleading look and Dave shrugged and nodded. Dave took the suspect from the sergeant’s car and put him in our car. I asked him what was up. He said that Sgt Reynold’s asked us to book his suspect, because he was afraid that the Watch Commander, Lt Denise Oglesby, would yell at him for leaving the concert to try and catch a murderer, ¼ mile away. That, and he and his team really wanted to get back to the Duran Duran concert.
I asked Dave what did he think the lieutenant would do when she saw us bringing a guy in for weed, when there was a football game that was expected to erupt into a fight and a murder investigation going on. Dave shrugged and said,
“I guess he figures our careers have gone as far as they’re going, anyway, but he still has time to move up a rank, or two.”
I thought about that and admitted he had a point.
We arrived at the station, as a smiling Lt Ogesby walked out the back door on her way home. She saw us and asked,
“Hi guys! You make a hook?”,
to which Dave and I could only look ashamedly at the ground and mumble,
“Sort of.”
VERDICT – Detectives of O.S.S., the Court finds ye Guilty of “Actin’ High & Mighty & Hoity Toity”
SENTENCE – Detectives, the Court orders yer hoity toity green windbreakers, ye be so fond of, be dyed pink, and yer jeans’ll be replaced by spandex shorts. We’ll see how cool ye are then! ‘Course this may not act as much of a deterrent, fer that Broadway musical lovin’ dandy, Fred Reynolds, but me thinks it’ll get the attention o’ the rest o’ youse high ‘n’ mighty buggers! ‘Ceptin’ fer the ladies on the team o’ course. Now I’m a goin’ ta go easy on the ladies, not on account o’, I be a gentleman, but on account o’ they be fresh hands on this ship, an’ not knowin’ the way things run on this deck, me thinks they was easily led astray, by them that’s been around the horn.
Mikey, Mikey, Mikey. After all the help an' guidance me n Dave have given ye during yer time workin' with us, ye treat us like this? On the say-so of that powder puff, Luis Trejo, no less? The Court be mighty disappointed in ye, laddie. MIGHTY disappointed. Ye may think ye've got off light with this case, but you an' I both be knowin' thar be some storytellin' waitin fer ye in the near future, boyo. The VERY near future. And a very special story it is, taint' it, boy? VERY special. HAR, HAR, HAR, HAR, HAR!
Case #39 – The People vs O.S.S. (Above the law) (part 2 to Case #38)
After about 3 weeks worth of detective work, Jane Doe discovered that the windbreaker's not always greener on the other side. She pulled up stakes and jumped back into a radio car, leaving the O.S.S. spot to be filled again. Jorge Padilla got the call. Jorge was still in the Mexican version of a snit (una snita) over having been passed over for a newbie ruca in the first place. So he turned up his nose and said,
“NO WAY, JOSE!”
Cliff Jones got the nod, but Cliff had just made training officer, and wanted to see if he was as good a coach as he was a player. The list was getting slim. After a coin toss, and then another coin toss, and another, all of which came up in Mike Gomez’ favor, the Captain saw it as a sign from God, that, on the fourth attempt, the coin fell in the toilet, so he reluctantly picked up his Magic 8-ball to choose Jane Doe’s replacement.
“Ohhhh, Magic 8-ball, who shall (“should”, is not in the department’s vocabulary) I choose to be the new O.S.S. detective?”
He nervously turned the shiny black orb over and looked at the clear circle of plastic underneath. White letters slowly floated up out of the blackness, and into view, forming the cryptic answer,
“Try again later”
Exactly one hour later, the Captain nervously picked up his Magic 8 ball again. As he turned the mystical orb over and gazed reverently into the blackness, these words floated up from the inky depths;
“Anybody, but Kim”
By process of elimination, the Captain chose Mike Gomez to be the newest O.S.S. detective. Congratulations Mikey.
A few weeks after Mike joined O.S.S. and became our station’s newest detective, O.S.S. suddenly got an influx of bodies from other stations. This meant their killer workload dropped. Good news for the guys who had been working back there for so long. Bad news for Eric Ehrhorn, who should have toughed it out, just a few months more, because now he was stuck with Larry Thompson as his sergeant on the Park Enforcement Team and Larry preferred to have attractive young women on his team. Eric was still attractive, but he wasn't that young anymore... mmmmm, nope, I can't think of anything else that Larry would have considered a disqualifying factor for his "ideal" team.
On November 11, 2007, Carson High School was playing Banning High School, their traditional rivals, in a C.I.F. game. Trouble was expected;
1- because both schools have more than their fair share of feral children, unused to the ways of a decent society and,
2- because the stadium at Carson H.S, seats 3,000, but they were expecting 10,000 to show up, meaning there would be 7,000 angry, frustrated fans, most of whom have not yet even signed up for their court ordered anger management classes. Of course the problem could have been mitigated by making it a pre-event ticket sale, with no tickets sold at the door, but L.A. School officials have their own Magic 8 balls to consult with for policy decisions.
About 20 deputies were assigned to keep an eye on the perimeter neighborhoods of the school to discourage bad behavior. That same night, O.S.S. had already signed up for overtime at a Duran Duran style band concert, several miles away, at the Stub Hub Arena (or whatever it's called). Well, that night, there was a double shooting in the Leadership neighborhood, located on the south side of the Stub Hub Arena. The suspects were from the Stevenson Village neighborhood, located on the north side of the Stub Hub Arena. The arena is right in the middle of these two neighborhoods. The O.S.S. detectives did what they do, which is to go help with the investigation. They left their assigned overtime posts at the peaceful, and uneventful concert, drove about 400 yards to the Stevenson Village neighborhood and started looking for the murder suspect’s vehicle. Dave Kluth and I were reassigned from the high school to help with the murder investigation. We also drove to the Stevenson Village neighborhood.
Shortly after turning in to Stevenson Village, we saw O.S.S's Sgt. Fred Reynolds, and Detective Mark Wedel on a cul-desac. They had some people detained in a vehicle that matched the murder suspect’s vehicle (it turned out not to be). We stopped to back them up. One of the people they had detained, was a guy with enough weed for a possession for sales case. They sat him in their backseat, while they spoke to the other vehicle occupants. About six other O.S.S. detectives rolled up, including Luis Trejo, and his protégé, Mike Gomez. Detective Trejo told us where he kept his booking paperwork and asked us to fill out the paperwork. DETECTIVE Gomez started to head to the car to start the paperwork himself, but Luis stopped him by quickly grabbing his shoulder, pursing his lips and subtly shaking his head, “no”, then he nodded slightly toward us. The confused look on Mike’s face caused Luis to extrapolate further, by slightly lifting and shaking the left shoulder of Mike’s O.S.S. windbreaker, then slowly pointing at his own O.S.S. windbreaker with the other hand, then shaking his index finger in a, “no-no”, fashion, before subtly pointing his hand, palm up, at Kluth and me,while cocking his head slightly and raising an eyebrow in an, "understand?", fashion.
Mike was confused for a second, after all, he had always jumped to do things for deputies far more senior than he. Now, he realized that those days were over. HE was a DETECTIVE now, and the days of being respectful to the likes of Wayde Farrell, Mike Chacon and Dave Kluth were in the past! As soon as Luis saw the light of recognition in Mike’s eyes, he gave him a wink and a silent nod of approval. As Mike looked around at the other detectives from the O.S.S team, he saw that they had all stopped in the middle of their various detective tasks, and were all looking at him with little knowing smiles of cameraderie along with little winks, that were accompanied by thumbs ups, index finger points, or slight nods of the head, before they all turned back to what they had been doing, which was pretty much, just standing around bitching about the concert they were now missing. Mike realized how special he was. Mike gave one last look at Wayde and Dave, two deputies who he had always looked up to, then gave a dismissive snort and turned his back on them, as he and the other detectives stood around looking all detectivey in their green windbreakers and jeans.
About ten minutes later, Sgt Fred Reynolds came up and pulled Kluth aside. Dave took out a cigarette and put it to his lips, as Sgt Reynolds, surprisingly, lit it for him. Then Sgt Reynolds whispered into Kluth’s ear for several minutes. I saw Dave’s eyebrow cock as he blew a ring of smoke into the air. Then Sarge looked at Dave with a pleading look and Dave shrugged and nodded. Dave took the suspect from the sergeant’s car and put him in our car. I asked him what was up. He said that Sgt Reynold’s asked us to book his suspect, because he was afraid that the Watch Commander, Lt Denise Oglesby, would yell at him for leaving the concert to try and catch a murderer, ¼ mile away. That, and he and his team really wanted to get back to the Duran Duran concert.
I asked Dave what did he think the lieutenant would do when she saw us bringing a guy in for weed, when there was a football game that was expected to erupt into a fight and a murder investigation going on. Dave shrugged and said,
“I guess he figures our careers have gone as far as they’re going, anyway, but he still has time to move up a rank, or two.”
I thought about that and admitted he had a point.
We arrived at the station, as a smiling Lt Ogesby walked out the back door on her way home. She saw us and asked,
“Hi guys! You make a hook?”,
to which Dave and I could only look ashamedly at the ground and mumble,
“Sort of.”
VERDICT – Detectives of O.S.S., the Court finds ye Guilty of “Actin’ High & Mighty & Hoity Toity”
SENTENCE – Detectives, the Court orders yer hoity toity green windbreakers, ye be so fond of, be dyed pink, and yer jeans’ll be replaced by spandex shorts. We’ll see how cool ye are then! ‘Course this may not act as much of a deterrent, fer that Broadway musical lovin’ dandy, Fred Reynolds, but me thinks it’ll get the attention o’ the rest o’ youse high ‘n’ mighty buggers! ‘Ceptin’ fer the ladies on the team o’ course. Now I’m a goin’ ta go easy on the ladies, not on account o’, I be a gentleman, but on account o’ they be fresh hands on this ship, an’ not knowin’ the way things run on this deck, me thinks they was easily led astray, by them that’s been around the horn.
Mikey, Mikey, Mikey. After all the help an' guidance me n Dave have given ye during yer time workin' with us, ye treat us like this? On the say-so of that powder puff, Luis Trejo, no less? The Court be mighty disappointed in ye, laddie. MIGHTY disappointed. Ye may think ye've got off light with this case, but you an' I both be knowin' thar be some storytellin' waitin fer ye in the near future, boyo. The VERY near future. And a very special story it is, taint' it, boy? VERY special. HAR, HAR, HAR, HAR, HAR!
Comments
Post a Comment