BEING NICE IS REWARDING

By Trey Rusk

Running Code 3
September 28, 2019

I had lunch today with a retired cop and LE professor and he told me that back in his day, when he wanted to know anything about anybody in the building, all he had to do was ask the janitor.

Most of the time we speak to service oriented persons such a food servers and the clerk who works at the Dry Cleaners as acquaintances. We may of may not know their names. But because we are in law enforcement, they know us.

The sometimes so called unimportant people hold a wealth of information. The people who have service jobs are often over looked while mopping or emptying the trash but they hear and see things.

My father taught me to always treat the CEO and the maintenance staff of a company on the same level. People are people and everyone remembers how they have been treated by you.

I tell you these things because the Brotherhood at the Cop Shop sometimes includes non-law enforcement staff. Janitors, mechanics, and clerks that see and hear a lot. Now, I've always considered corrections officers to be cops. They take the same oath of office as street cops and the deal with the scum of the earth.

Let's not forget the trained volunteers who man the Citizens-on-Patrol and those who show up at a 24 hour crime scene with coffee and sandwiches. The person who sits at the front door of the station and gives information and directions. I always kept a box of Congratulatory, Sympathy and Thank You cards in my desk and addressed these folks when the occasion fit. I guarantee that if you dismiss these folks as nothing, you are making a big mistake.

I premised this blog with the rather lengthy analysis to tell you a story.

I attended a department Christmas Party. During the party people exchanged gifts. The employees had pulled names from a sack and each gift was to have a $10 limit. My gift was a patrol bag with my name and rank on it. It cost much more than $10. I received it from a jailer named Norman whom I knew made much less than me. He struggled to make ends meet with his family. I sent him a Thank You card. I had gotten to know him while taking smoke breaks outside, usually in the evening. We discussed most topics and I knew he hung out with some half outlaw bikers.

I was getting close to identifying a badly decomposed body. My snitch had disappeared.

As the case was about to go cold, I found a envelope on my desk with my name on it. I opened it and the note read, "The body is John Smith from Victoria." Once the body was identified, known associates were rounded up and a confession was obtained. I had become busy and hadn't seen Norman in a couple of weeks. The Captain told me he had quit and moved out of state.

I knew Norman had written the note, because the handwriting was the same as the Christmas Card in the patrol bag he had given me.

Had Norman given me the name for the sake of justice? I believe he did. After all, he had taken the same oath I took.

Note: The names and locations have been changed in the story because I don't want anyone to get hurt.

Be nice to folks.

That's the way I see it.