A Lesson For The Rookie

A LESSON FOR THE ROOKIE
(PART ONE)
I was training a rookie the night we arrested a man for minor infraction.
I was going to read the suspect his rights, as always, but I decided to leave it to the rookie. While the rookie was reading the man his rights, we put him in handcuffs. I noticed the hands of the rookie were shaking, it was his first time. I know, that’s not easy.
We were going totake the prisoner directly to jail, but it was going to be a long night, and I wanted my rookie to cool down before getting to the station, so we decided to stop for coffee and donuts. Of course, we didn’t share our donuts with the guy in handcuffs because it was not good to fraternize with prisoners. He knew we were tough cops and that we were not going to try to soften him up in exchange forinformation. We wanted him prison.
We asked the dispatcher to call the judge and notify him that we were coming. The judge met us in his office. When we were walking in, we could see it was a large room. While the judge was trying to finish a case, we told the man to take a seat. The judge looked at us and at the prisoner while he was talking to a detective called Harlan, and he told me to take thehandcuffs off the prisoner. I was going to explain to the Judge that to have him uncuffed was not a safety maneuver, but at the precise moment when Harlan was leaving the room, he repeated the order raising his voice. He wanted Harlan to hear how bossy he could get. Once alone, I tried to tell the judge again that I didn’t think this was a good idea, but he got upset, and ordered me again to take thehandcuffs off the man. I must confess, I didn’t want to, but I felt I had no choice.
I tried to keep myself between the prisoner and the door, which led directly outside. My rookie didn’t give it much thought and stood near the judge’s desk.
“A POLICE STORY”
He was more interested in learning the bureaucratic proceedings. The judge explained the suspect the charges and the amount of bail, incase someone wanted to post bail for him before the trial.
The man calmly sat there and nodded his head to what the judge was saying. Then, the judge asked us to come up to his desk. He wanted to show us the order for the prisoner to be taken to jail, and the warrant he just signed to search the house of one the man’s accomplices. He was also giving us the authorization to arrest that man too. Ilooked at the prisoner while I was heading towards the desk. But as soon as I passed the chair on which the prisoner was sitting, he jumped up like a spring, took the rookie’s extra gun, and ran out the door! My rookie took off after him and so did I! In the background the judge was screaming at the top of his lungs: “Shoot! Shoot him, shoot him!”….

A LESSON FOR THE ROOKIE
(PART Two)
“Shoothim, shoot him!” the judge kept on saying while the man was running out.
I kept on yelling to my rookie not to shoot because we didn’t know for sure if he was a criminal or not. Maybe he was not guilty, he was just scared. When the man reached 38th avenue, I was screaming through my radio for back up. Man, the man was an athlete; he sure knew how to run fast. We chased him for several blocks buthe didn’t slow his pace down. I must confess,
I was getting exhausted.
The man was heading towards a quiet alley, filled with trash can and a stinky smell, so I took a fast decision, I was going to take a short ct and meet him from the order side. But it was not a trace of him when I got there, just the meow of a lonely cat in the alley and the sound of my breathing. Damn it! My lungs wereabout to burst and he wasn’t there! The man went around the corner while I was practically chasing a ghost. I couldn’t get him on that spot, but I kept on running until I finally saw him again. He was entering another alley, and maybe this time he was going to have no way out. I knew there was a huge, tall fence chained with a rusty lock. When I got there, the man was trying to jump over the...