Dave Story...

From Dave...

So... For the most part, I get bored doing traffic stops. Most people get a warning because once I find out they don’t have warrants or aren’t at least suspended, I lose interest. I make traffic stops hoping to get someone off the street who needs to be in jail. I really don’t care about giving regular people tickets. But I still do stops compulsively hoping for that one good stop.

Tonight I made that 1 in 1,000 stop that results in a good pop. I was going through a four-way stop intersection. A black 1989 Honda 2-door was going the other way. It was dark, and it had its headlights on. I couldn't make out the occupants. I glanced in my mirror and saw the rear of the vehicle looked completely blacked out. No tail lights. I whipped my car around and followed to check it out.

As I caught up to the car it had all 3 brake lights illuminated. It had its headlights on still. Periodically, the brake lights would flicker off, revealing that the tail lights were not working unless the driver’s foot was on the brake. We got to a stop sign. As the car started to move again, the rear end went dark momentarily. The driver was clearly riding the brake pedal in an effort to prevent me from seeing the equipment defect. The car had 3 white males in it.

I put a stop on the car and went up to it. The driver was nervous and his dress/demeanor just screamed “prison.” He was wearing a light blue jersey with a matching cap that said “LA” on it. He had a silver chain with an “LA” pendant hanging from it. His numerous tattoos included a “310” area code (which can also mean “13” for the Mexican Mafia--Sureno) and a filled in tear-shaped tattoo under his eye.

The other 2 dudes were pretty sketchy too.

I had my driver exit the car, and I patted him down for weapons. He gave me a name (Willis) and said he was suspended. No ID or wallet with him, of course. He could not, for the life of him, give me an address where he is staying, or even a phone number. Right… I called him on the brake pedal thing. He initially denied it, but then admitted he was trying to keep the defect from showing.

My sarge showed up to cover me, and we started to sort them all out. One of the passengers said the car was his. We checked his name out, and he ended up having a BOLO (be-on-the-look-out) indicating probable cause to arrest him for a DV Protection Order violation. The other passenger had ID on him, and ended up with 4 warrants, 2 of them for felonies. That guy is quite busy with ID theft, meth, and robbery.

So, all 3 of these dudes get arrested. As I am about to take them all to jail, my driver, the big, fat liar head, admits he gave me a false name (which is felony since he used a real person). He gave me his real name, Thomas, and it turns out he was wanted for a felony as well. Two warrants for him.

When I took them to jail, it was like a happy family reunion; one of the custody officers looking up and saying “Thomas! Where ya been, dude?” So, in one traffic stop I made 2 felony arrests, 1 misdemeanor domestic violence arrest, with a total of 6 warrants and 2 new charges. I got 3 animals off the street with HUGE histories of arrest for auto prowls, auto theft, burglary, robbery, assault, and drug possession. Didn’t find any dope in the car though.

Then I got to write the report for 2 hours…