I Died Because I Let The Bad Guy Take My Gun!

**This is the ongoing story of becoming a police officer in my forties and then becoming The Bad Luck Detective. It’s best to start with the first post.

Week six began. We sported our new polo shirts, and it was nice to breath without a tie around our necks. We could hear Class 96 being yelled at by their Sergeant, but Sgt. Dickens lowered his voice and pretended we were human. Inspection went smoothly and we were only given twenty pushups. We were not assigned a single hill run. We realized Class 96 would be spending a lot of time on the hill and our Sergeant wanted us to appear superior. It wouldn’t last, but that week we suffered very few punishments.

It was Monday morning and we sat down for our weekly test. Nine cadets did not pass. We lost two cadets the following day on retake. Cadet Rodriguez barely scrapped through. Out of the original thirty-five we had twenty-nine cadets remaining.

I was lucky the academics came easy for me. The physical and defensive tactics training did not. I had never been last at anything in my life. During my childhood, I was athletic and competitive. At the academy, I felt like a loser.

Wednesday morning we were marched to our rooms before class for a surprise room inspection. We were made to stand at attention outside our dorm rooms, with the door open. We could not enter the room before inspection began. When I opened our door I realized our radio was blaring. Donna began having a panic attack because she’d left it on. I looked around and couldn’t see our Sergeant or any class advisors. I ran inside the room and shut the radio off. As I came back out, Stg. Dickens rounded the corner and saw me. The yelling began. He asked what I was doing in the room and I told him the radio was left on. He asked if I understood the rules of dorm inspection. I told him I did and he then gave me ten personal hill runs and a ten page memo to write on following rules.

I was glad Donna had not spoken up. It would have landed us both in hot water. She had left the radio on, but I disobeyed orders and went into the room. Donna joined me for the hill runs that afternoon, and helped to correct my memo that night. She also shined my shoes because I was not able to lead the study group. It was wonderful to have such a good friend. We held each other up and kept each other going.

Thursday morning at defensive tactics we fought for our guns. We were each paired up with someone of similar body size. The only person available for me was Donna. We had one “blue gun” between us, and first one person got a grip on the gun and then the other, until our four hands were holding the gun on the ground. A whistle was blown and the fight began. The winner was the person able to take control of the gun, getting it away from the other person.

The other cadets formed a circle around the fighters and kept them on the mat. The only rule was there were no rules, anything went. The fights were brutal. Against all odds I beat Donna. After everyone was finished, we were divided into two groups, one group of winners and one of losers. The losers were given their punishment. They had to write a letter telling their family why they died at work that day. The letter had to be turned in the following morning to our squad leaders. We were told they would actually be mailed to family members.

Later that afternoon, we noticed some unusual activity in the hallway, outside our classroom door. The leader from squad six and our class leader, Cadet Clark, were called to Sgt. Dickens’ office. About twenty minutes later Cadet Clark came back into the room and collected squad leader six’s classroom materials. We never saw the squad leader again and a new one was chosen for squad six. The rumor would later circulate that the unfortunate cadet was caught lying on his police application, and when his background was closely examined, the lie came out. He would never again be eligible to apply as a police officer in the state of Arizona. We were now down to twenty-eight cadets.

That evening Donna typed her letter. This was psychological torture for her. Donna had a six year old daughter at home and addressed the letter to her. She cried for hours and I had a hard time getting her out of her funk. The letters were never sent to family members, but it was a hard lesson whether you won or lost.

Friday was uneventful and I headed home to spend time with my husband. He was lonely without me, and I managed to pull myself out of a pain induced coma, and take a day trip with him on Saturday. I cleaned my house on Sunday morning and then headed back to the academy at noon for some much needed study time. It was now the beginning of week seven, and the first, of a two week driving course. Our classroom time was cut in half and we headed to the driving track.

Before the training I thought I was a good driver, but I learned an entirely new way of approaching driving situations at the academy. I never considered the difficulties of driving, turning the stirring wheel, and holding a microphone in your hand, while trying to speak into it, without getting everything twisted up. The training was very intensive, like everything else at the academy, but it was fun as well.

The phrase “stopping on a dime” had to have been invented by cops. We learned to stop, swerve and make “J” turns, while being shot at with paintball guns. Our windows had to be down so we could actually be hit if we didn’t do what we were shown. It was fun, exciting and for some cadets painful.

Driving made the two weeks speed by (pun intended), but it didn’t stop our anxiety over the approaching ninth week. We were facing our three hundred question midterm test, and also our first practical tests; where we would be put in pretend scenarios with play actors. This was all “do or die” testing. If we didn’t pass the midterm we would be sent home. If we didn’t pass the practical tests we would be sent home. Oh yeah, we also had our first official POPAT agility test. We would be given two times to pass POPAT, the first was week nine, and then a final time one week before graduation.

I stayed at the academy that weekend, practiced POPAT, studied, and applied ice packs. The stress continued to build.