The one bit of bad news: Jimmy has poison oak.
I HAD A GOOD DAY AT WORK. Finally!
We've had two break-ins at my work site, with large dollar values of construction supplies stolen both times. Both thefts had the same M.O. - we believe they came in on foot and used our equipment to load the copper/contruction supplies, etc. onto one of our own trucks, then left in the truck, cutting fences and locks as needed on their way out. The exit points have both been along a stretch of fenceline that runs parallel to a major thoroughfare. The intrusions were spaced about a month apart, and as of last Friday, it's been a month since the last one.
At almost midnight last night, I was patrolling along that self-same fenceline. Almost as soon as I turned onto the easement, I found a dilapidated old blue truck parked there. Unoccupied. Never happened before. But someone could have broken down, maybe, and pulled a little further off the road than usual. I noted down a description of the vehicle, and proceeded. After I went a bit further, say 30 - 40 feet, I found a brand-new cut in the fenceline. Hrm. Went back to the truck, didn't touch anything, but saw a bag of tools in the bed.
Called the sheriff's department. Waited with in my patrol truck with the windows up, doors locked, engine running, at a vantage point where I could see both the truck and the hole in the fence. Sheriffs arrived after what seemed like an ETERNITY, but was really less than twenty minutes. They had a look around, at the truck and the hole in the fence. Nobody rolled their eyes at me. They stood around with their cop-lights awhirling, (thereby notifying anyone in the vicinity with eyeballs that, HEY, 'THE MAN' FINDS SOMETHING OVER HERE VERRRRRY INTERESTING), and discussing the matter. Finally, they decided that the best plan of action was for two of them to drop back and kill their lights, while me and the third deputy, the one in the SUV, went back onto the property and made a lot of noise approaching the hot zone. Hoping that if anyone were on the property, in the process of looting the maintenance yard, they would be scared into running back to their currently-surrounded-by-a-cluster-of-brilliantly-illuminated-cop-cars vehicle. So that's what Deputy Gutierrez and I did.
We didn't find anyone. And no one made a mad dash for the crappy old truck, allowing themselves to be scooped up by the waiting deputies. But, when we returned to the fenceline, the lead deputy told me that there were fingerprints, which they had taken, and they'd had a look at the bag of tools and indeed there was a pair of bolt cutters in there, so they were happy to call it an attempted burglary (felony) and impound the vehicle. And of course, there was the registration to the truck, which yielded a name and an address. Which they will be following up on today.
So, I didn't singlehandedly apprehend the bad guys. (I suspect they had eyeballs and decided to hotfoot it out of there via the wonder of shoe leather - I wonder why?). BUT, I may have recovered evidence that will allow the guys in the white hats to make an arrest. Making my working life a lot easier, for starters. And, I FINALLY DID SOMETHING. My name is on a report that will seen by the mucky-mucks, and for a good reason. Every single person I spoke to last night, from my boss's boss, to the guy at the command center, to my relief officer, said "Good job!" My boss's boss even said "Thanks a million!" more than once. So, this is officially my best day on the job, ever.
Also, I made a highly-praised batch of vegetarian taco soup, (thanks, Sonya, for the idea), yesterday evening, and this morning, upon my return home, I did a flawless job of parallel parking. Clearly, I'm operating in a state of grace!
We've had two break-ins at my work site, with large dollar values of construction supplies stolen both times. Both thefts had the same M.O. - we believe they came in on foot and used our equipment to load the copper/contruction supplies, etc. onto one of our own trucks, then left in the truck, cutting fences and locks as needed on their way out. The exit points have both been along a stretch of fenceline that runs parallel to a major thoroughfare. The intrusions were spaced about a month apart, and as of last Friday, it's been a month since the last one.
At almost midnight last night, I was patrolling along that self-same fenceline. Almost as soon as I turned onto the easement, I found a dilapidated old blue truck parked there. Unoccupied. Never happened before. But someone could have broken down, maybe, and pulled a little further off the road than usual. I noted down a description of the vehicle, and proceeded. After I went a bit further, say 30 - 40 feet, I found a brand-new cut in the fenceline. Hrm. Went back to the truck, didn't touch anything, but saw a bag of tools in the bed.
Called the sheriff's department. Waited with in my patrol truck with the windows up, doors locked, engine running, at a vantage point where I could see both the truck and the hole in the fence. Sheriffs arrived after what seemed like an ETERNITY, but was really less than twenty minutes. They had a look around, at the truck and the hole in the fence. Nobody rolled their eyes at me. They stood around with their cop-lights awhirling, (thereby notifying anyone in the vicinity with eyeballs that, HEY, 'THE MAN' FINDS SOMETHING OVER HERE VERRRRRY INTERESTING), and discussing the matter. Finally, they decided that the best plan of action was for two of them to drop back and kill their lights, while me and the third deputy, the one in the SUV, went back onto the property and made a lot of noise approaching the hot zone. Hoping that if anyone were on the property, in the process of looting the maintenance yard, they would be scared into running back to their currently-surrounded-by-a-cluster-of-brilliantly-illuminated-cop-cars vehicle. So that's what Deputy Gutierrez and I did.
We didn't find anyone. And no one made a mad dash for the crappy old truck, allowing themselves to be scooped up by the waiting deputies. But, when we returned to the fenceline, the lead deputy told me that there were fingerprints, which they had taken, and they'd had a look at the bag of tools and indeed there was a pair of bolt cutters in there, so they were happy to call it an attempted burglary (felony) and impound the vehicle. And of course, there was the registration to the truck, which yielded a name and an address. Which they will be following up on today.
So, I didn't singlehandedly apprehend the bad guys. (I suspect they had eyeballs and decided to hotfoot it out of there via the wonder of shoe leather - I wonder why?). BUT, I may have recovered evidence that will allow the guys in the white hats to make an arrest. Making my working life a lot easier, for starters. And, I FINALLY DID SOMETHING. My name is on a report that will seen by the mucky-mucks, and for a good reason. Every single person I spoke to last night, from my boss's boss, to the guy at the command center, to my relief officer, said "Good job!" My boss's boss even said "Thanks a million!" more than once. So, this is officially my best day on the job, ever.
Also, I made a highly-praised batch of vegetarian taco soup, (thanks, Sonya, for the idea), yesterday evening, and this morning, upon my return home, I did a flawless job of parallel parking. Clearly, I'm operating in a state of grace!