This is the June 20, 1998 evening report filed by Mark Pedersen, rider and official sidekick of Officer Matt Pedersen of the Arlington Police Department.  All other names have been modified to protect the persons involved (From what, I have no idea).

At 2000, we were briefed by Sergeant Kafka, who gave us a short update on the last 24 hours of activities.  Apparently the individual who burned up in his car the night before was STILL dead, and there were some people (we'll call them Jose) whom we were to BOLO - This means "Be on the Lookout" - I know all that cop jargon now, and that's no 10-250.

We selected our patrol car for the evening and made sure it was stocked with all the proper supplies:   Flares, spare tire, paperwork, shotgun, donuts..  No donuts. Matt has a very anti-donut philosophy.  Matt left me with the impression that if I insisted on stopping for donuts at any time in this patrol, he would most likely shoot me.  He further explained that this was an Arlington Police philosophy, but I saw bear claws in the police station vending machine - and that's all I'm going to say about that.

Some officer had left our patrol car with an empty tank, which is the cop equivalent of leaving a trickle of milk in the jug and putting it back in the fridge - bad form.  While we were filling up, our first call came in.  A 10-year old boy (We'll call him Jose) who had been reported missing earlier in the day, had returned to his apartment and found no one there.  He apparently cut his foot on some glass breaking in and would now require stitches.  Matt had dealt with Jose before, and this is about par for the course.  Previous issues include numerous runaways and the lighting of little fires on his bedroom floor.  Jose is not without his issues.  When we arrived on the scene, paramedics had already bandaged his foot and another officer was talking to his mom on a neighbor's phone.  Mom was having a great time at a wedding in Fort Worth.  Good for her - Sometimes you just gotta say "Screw your kids, have some fun!"  We also found out that Jose was a little distraught from relationship problems.  His little girlfriend, obviously unimpressed with his fire-starting skills, had dumped him that day.  And as we all know,   emotional commitment in relationships is at its zenith when you're 10, and no doubt the lingering feelings contributed to little Jose's decision to kick his way into the empty apartment.

The incident was concluded with Jose's mom on-route to the hospital and Matt & I returning to the station to append "Found" to little Jose's missing child report.

Our next call was a soap-opera in progress involving a loving family, a heated argument, a juvenile psycho-brother (we'll call "Tyrone"), some broken glass, and a knife.  In the patrol car, we were receiving updates on the little computer as the drama was unfolding.  When Tyrone picked up a knife and threatened to slit his loving sister's throat, we were bumped up to 'Code 3' which means.. you guessed it.. LIGHTS AND SIRENS!  Cool!  We were on the other side of the city at this time, so we got to do the 100+ m.p.h. tour of scenic Arlington.  We were the first unit on the scene, but didn't have long to wait before backup arrived.  It was decided that I would boldly guard the car until Matt gave me a coded 'no-more-knife' signal over the radio.  This struck me as a marvelous plan.   

Tyrone had put up the knife and everyone was involved in sort of a 'group chat' when I was able to join the party.  Aside from the early-evening punching and hitting, nobody was filleted or  otherwise injured in a serious manner.   As you can probably imagine, the stories were varied, but Tyrone's one-man-knife-show and prior history of this kind of family love meant that he was going to be leaving with us that evening.  Matt and I stayed to take a victim statement while Tyrone was fitted in the latest Arlington PD designer wristwear and led away by the other officer on the scene.  I was struck with the profound realization that other families act in ways completely different than the way I was brought up.   I mean, when Lisa and I threw stuff at each other and pulled knives on each other, it was all in good fun.

The next call seemed a bit odd from the start.  A lady had called in complaining that her brother was broadcasting messages on an intercom system telling her to commit suicide, so he can be the sole inheritor of the Treasure of Sierra Madre.  OoooKaaay, right.

While I felt we should've use the siren and lights again, Matt didn't think this was an emergency - fine.  We were greeted at the door by the harassee (We'll call her Skitzy) and her extremely aged husband.  Our first observation was that the aforementioned aged husband (who later explained to Matt that he was born in 1907), had 2 thick, white rivulets of drool emanating from each corner of his mouth - was this some sort of tooth-brushing accident?  I couldn't quite tell, and I couldn't quite look at this guy for the remainder of the evening either.  The husband (We'll call him 'Droolie') seemed to think everything was fine and that perhaps we didn't really need to worry about this particular call.  Skitzy on the other hand, backed up her original story with more detail.  Her brother Jack, it seems, was indeed broadcasting messages for Skitzy to commit suicide.  He was using 'Witchcraft' and 'Psycho-cybernetics' and the use of a hidden intercom system (which we were unable to find with a quick search) to broadcast these messages. This was just one of many apparent mechanisms Jack was using to undermine Skitzy's sanity.  Jack was apparently also responsible for the addition of mineral oils and castor oils to Skitzy's water supply.   These oils, according to Skitzy, would upset the already delicate balance of natural oils in her skin, making her 'all oily' and causing her to 'become bloated'.   Fiendish - Truly fiendish..  As the resident biologist/chemist, Matt had me 'test' the tap water.  I was happy to report that the various oils had been washed out.  However, we were then informed that Jack's chemical trickery was not limited to the tap water - He was also using his extensive drug-world contacts to obtain Heroin and substitute it for Skitzy's extra-strength Excedrin.

Droolie wasn't contributing much at this point, partially due to the fact his hearing aid was missing and he couldn't hear much of anything being discussed at this point.  Matt took him into the next room to have a loud conversation while I was left to talk with Skitzy and get more details about this hideous plot against her.  I was able to learn the following fascinating things about her world:

The Treasure of Sierra Madre was left to her by a recently deceased wealthy uncle (an oil-man) AND the Sioux nation.  I found this point particularly fascinating.

Jack was previously incarcerated a year at Leavenworth for drug-related charges.  He is still quite involved in the drug world (His contacts being predominantly from Mexico and South America), and this is how he gets the amphetamines to stay up 24 hours a day and broadcast his suicide-messages.  Now everything started to make sense to me, so I asked if Jack had been in the military; it seemed like a logical assumption to me.. but,

"Oh no.  The military would never take him.   You see, he has had duodenal ulcers since the 9th grade."  Ah, Genetic?, I asked. "Oh no, stress."  Upon further inquiry, I learned that the home life was very stressful for Skitzy and Jack.  Where she was only beaten in the house, her brother would be beaten in the garage (and this was somehow much worse). She also remembered vividly, how their acting mother had buried an axe in Jack's skull one fine day. Thank goodness he survived.

Further inquiry revealed the amazing fact that her real parents were indeed Adolph Hitler and Eva Braun. "Oh, so you have German ancestry", I asked..  "No" she said.  I accepted this completely.

She further explained that Elizabeth Tailor and Michael Wilding were her REAL real parents.  Of course!  Now it all makes sense.. Though I'm still unsure how it relates to her brother Jack screwing wolverines and obtaining fecal samples - This is what she was expounding on when Matt came out of the bedroom with Droolie.  We wrapped things up quickly and assured her we would do what we could (As we now had a current description of Jack:  long, white hair).

As we walked back to the squad car, Matt shared some information he obtained from Droolie.  It seems as Skitzy is currently taking a cocktail of anti-schizophrenic medicines.  "Really?" I asked.

Comforted in the fact that the state might be paying a visit to Skitzy and Droolie, We went to our next call - backup for a possible DWI.   Matt's Spanish would come in handy and subsequently impress his Sergeant who had pulled over a couple of non-English speaking gentlemen.  DWIs are a legal nightmare, and even Matt's Spanish, as good as it is, would probably result in a court dismissal if he tried to give a field-sobriety test.  So we waited for a 3rd backup unit with a bilingual officer to come and perform the tests.  I think the official police term for what they were is "snot-slinging drunk".  We got to arrest the stumbling companion for public intoxication and brought him down to the main HQ & jail.  The bummer part is that the driver had just gotten off of probation for DWI.   Well, there's more where that came from, I guess.

Matt filled out a report at the station and we went upstairs so I can see the dispatch room.  It was cool.  The computer geek in me was sufficiently impressed.  While there, I convinced Matt to hit his radio's emergency button so I can see what that looked like to the dispatch people.  Even though we announced it loudly to the room, some of the dispatchers had decided to ignore us and freaked out when they got the flashing red lights.. "We got an emergency here!.." - hee hee. No you don't - It's just us.. hee hee.

Leaving the HQ, we went out to our last event of the morning - backup for an officer who pulled over a car full of punk gangster-lookin' guys.   They were cooperative, but they all had pockets FULL of quarters.  Jose, the driver, esplained to us that their friend had a gambling machine.  (They would never steal quarters from a Laundromat or anything like that..) Uh-huh. Sure. Jos-b, had a fake ID from some amigo in California, Jos-c and Jos-d were quiet, but shot nervous glances at their more verbal amigos when they were caught lying.  All the punk-kids were released in the end, as the warrant associated with the car was for someone else. 

I spent the last part of the early morning gunning people with a laser speed-check gun.  Having just received a speeding ticket myself, I felt I was betraying something deep inside me, but we never caught anyone, so ethically it was OK in the end.  Besides, laser guns are cool.  Matt dropped me back off at the station around 5:30..

What a night!  Drunks and Gangs, Sirens and Schizophrenia, Pretty neat stuff for one night - hard to believe that it's all in a night's work for Officer Pedersen.  I'm certainly looking forward to the next ride.   Maybe I can return the favor sometime and Matt can come watch me format a hard drive, or install Windows NT, or rebuild a computer's registry.. now THAT'S excitement.

Mark
June, 1998