Violent Night, Holy Night . . .

Once in a while, my detective division has a quiet, uneventful night. A night where the detectives more or less sit and twiddle their collective thumbs.

Last night was not one of those nights.

4:00pm - I walk into the squad room and get hit with a burglary that was reported on Sunday. Nice. The doer entered the building by breaking a window, and despite the blood trail from the window to the storage area, the cops did not process the scene. Hmm, I would think that the doer's BLOOD would give us a clue as to who committed the burglary!

4:20pm - The lieutenant yells to Stan that there is a police discharge. A cop shot a pit bull twice as it was attacking a girl and her grandmother. Stan asks me if I want to go out to the scene. Hmm, a chance to help process a police discharge, collect shell casings, and see a bleeding dog? Yeah, I'm in!

When we arrived on the scene, the officer and the dog were still on location. The dog was indeed hit twice - and bleeding like a stuck pig - but it was still alive. According to the officer and the witnesses (the ones who would talk to us, and not the ones who told us to go f**k ourselves, that is) the grandmother was walking her poodle when the pit bull escaped from its yard. The pit bull charged the poodle, and when granny and the granddaughter tried to intervene, the pit bull started tearing at them. Granny was bitten on the hand, but the girl was okay.

The cop pulled up to the scene, smartly cleared the area, and shot the pit bull point blank in the torso. The first shot only made the dog mad. The second one was enough for the pit bull to run away. The Internal Affairs Shooting Team arrived shortly after, and took the officer to IAB for a mandatory interview. The officer should be cleared quickly.

6:30pm - Dinner! Cup of Soup for me, so I can make Weight Watchers points.

8:00pm - The deskman tells Joe that there was a home invasion, and he has the job. I was caught up, so I went out to the scene with him. Get this story:

A black male enters a warehouse/apartment building with a kitchen knife. He grabs the occupants, an elderly Vietnamese couple, and forces them upstairs in the course of the robbery. The dirtbag believes that is where the couple keeps their money. When they get to the third floor, the black male puts the knife to the elderly male's back and walks him into the other room. Big mistake. As he turns away from the woman - who had to be 60 years old, and only five feet tall - the woman grabs a meat cleaver from the counter and chops the robber in the back of the head. The robber yells, and the woman hits him again, splitting his head open.

The robber drops the knife where he stands, and runs out of the house, trailing lots of blood. The trail stops where the robber collapses, and a medic unit is called. When police meet the couple, they tell them what happened, and describe the offender. The cops follow the blood trail to the medic unit, who is working on the offender, and the couple positively identifies the moron.

The offender is taken to the hospital, and while in the trauma room, he tries to fight with the female officers and the E.R. staff. The 18-year old claims he was hit with "something" for no reason, and denies ever robbing anyone. When the officers explain the he just got his ass kicked by a Vietnamese Dr. Ruth, the scumbag clams up.

10:30pm - After processing the scene, Joe and I go to the E.R. The cops say that the offender is not talking, and the hospital staff concurs. A sergeant walks in, and here's where Wyatt makes a funny:

Sergeant: "He's not talking? Do we know his name?"

Me: "Yeah. Ward Cleaver."

The room erupts in laughter.