Drunks in Public......?

From the Cop side: OK, I promised that since I’m now retired and they can’t fire me, I can tell more cop stories from the past.  First of all let me say one thing…almost all of the cops I’ve worked with in the last 32 years came to work each day trying to do a good job.  However, there were and are some who should not be in the business.  Some of those who should not be in the business have proven the “Peter Principle” and have risen to their level of incompetence…in some cases, they’ve gone even further. 

Like they say about college teachers, those who can’t do, teach.  In police work those who can’t police become administrators.  Some of these appear to sit in offices for hours each day trying to figure out how to harass and annoy those cops who actually have work to do. 

When I started out in the business, many were very heavy drinkers.  I have nothing against a person touching a bit of the adult beverages, but I don’t think it’s cool to actually show up at work drunk. 

One Saturday in 1979, I came in to work an overtime shift on dayshift.  I had just gotten off at midnight, got about 5 hours of sleep and came to work.  I was young, so getting enough sleep wasn’t a problem. 
I went to the locker room (which was also the break room, briefing room, interview room, TV room, and meeting room) and put on my gun belt and gear. 

I sat down with the old timers (any cop who’d worked longer than a year was an old timer to a rookie) and we waited for the watch commander to come in and brief us.  We waited and waited and waited.  After about 20 minutes into the shift, the most senior officer told me to go look for the watch commander. 

I checked the watch commander’s office.  I checked dispatch.  I checked the holding cells, I checked the garage where the fire trucks were…then I checked the men’s rest room.  No luck. 

One last place, I checked the ladies restroom. 

There HE was.  Passed out on the floor in a puddle of his own puke. 
I tried to wake him up, but I could still smell the extremely strong odor of an adult beverage emitting from his person.     I almost puked. 

I went back to the briefing room and informed the more senior officers and those who’d just gotten off the graveyard shift that the day shift watch commander was a passed out in the ladies restroom. 

I suggested that we help him up and get in into the office.  Joe, the most senior officer said: “nope, then he’ll just puke all over  that office….just leave him there.”

We went through about 4 hours of dayshift without a functioning watch commander.  When he finally woke up, he went home and we never saw him again that day.  I’m glad nothing too exciting happened that day…because I’d only been a cop for about 4 months and I’m not sure I’d known what to do.