Writing about Law Enforcement

            Pet peeve and red button time!  I have been stepping over bodies and visiting celebrities in their freshly burglared homes for about nine years.  I work as a crime scene photographer for the Los Angeles Police Department.  To say that I have seen it all seems somewhat redundant.

            So here is the thing that is stuck in my craw:  People who write about crime without any people in it frosts over my will to continue reading.  WHAT!?  You heard me; stop writing as though anyone who carries a gun and a badge is devoid of personality.  I work with FBI agents who have a better sense of humor over life and its lessons than the DMV-styled officious maunder that is today’s attempt at getting a reader behind the yellow tape.  By the way, the LAPD invented that stuff to keep politicians and other ilk from trampling over evidence.

            Example:  PIII Juarez led XA-21 mission ready as always.

            Result:  I am going to find where you live and…. 

            Let us see this more clearly shall we?  A PIII has been with the department for a while, approximately five years.  They can stay at that level, many choose to do so, or promote to detectives or administration by way of Sergeant.  A PIII is a Police Officer III.  Everything has a rank.  I am Photographer III, which is right below supervisor, who could also be ranked at various levels.

            It begins at the academy where an officer is either a boot or field trainee.  After graduation, they are sent out into the field and are become another officer’s partner.  On duty, a partner is like a ventricle; you cannot pull one out and have a functioning heart.

            Rank is important.  I have been on scene where two Detective III’s had to fight over who was in charge, and it came down to date of hire.  Oh, the poor fellow who graduated first.

            XA-21 is a Unit.  Basically, two officers patrolling anywhere in the area designated as 21.  It is somewhat of a mouthy insider; do not  use.

            Avoid power words like maximum or turbo.  Relate the relatable like an officer who sees their first dead child and it looks like their cousin.

            Tensions rise on scene when brass shows up.  It gets worse when politicians are involved.  Once, the District Attorney got me on the phone to tell me directly what to photograph.

            We all have our own method of writing.  Just think about the heart behind the badge that covers it.

            Some insider things you should know.  Bulletproof vests are never comfortable.  In the summer, they do not breathe and will make a hot day even more hellish.  In the winter, they are dense, causing the cold to come straight through.  They also bunch up when you sit down.

            A car is called a unit or shop; some still call them radio cars.

            SWAT stands for Special Weapons and Tactics and it saves more lives by less than lethal means.  Less than lethal are stuff like tasers, water cannons, ladders, so on and so forth.  They go the extra mile to stop someone from hurting themselves, but primarily anyone else.  Shootouts are nowhere near as common as you are led to believe.  The people in SWAT are extraordinary; they are in amazing shape and practice safe takedowns constantly. They are not the biggest badasses on the department.

            Special units and, in our case, Metro cops are far more likely to get into a nasty fight than anyone else.  They are also some of the nicest people I know.  Funny how true badasses know they are the 600 lb gorilla and do not need to flex.

            Officers cry.  I was shocked the first time I witnessed it.  I always let them know it is okay around me.

            Please, let us connect with the human being first before you start taking us into the world of your creation.  Detectives have been single moms needing a solid job or fresh out of the military with no idea of what to do with their lives.  It is true that all of us behind the thin blue line go into a mode when it is time, but we also have to go to the bathroom and find chow if we are stuck on a long scene.

           

Over

            The Christmas season is difficult in my business.  The juxtaposition of festive arrangements and bodies do not mix together well.  After eight years on this job, if I retire tomorrow, I will never miss seeing another murder next to a Christmas tree.

            Over the years, I have photographed an assault, a murder, a natural, and a suicide during the holidays:  A young man survived being stabbed many times about the head and chest; A young mother was shot at contact range while laying on her couch; An old man died in his living room after finally losing his battle with cancer; Another old man jumped from a bridge over the Harbor Freeway.  And to think, that was just during the week leading up to Christmas.

            Lately, I have been coming home to a decorated tree that fills my living room with the fresh scent of pine I remember as a child.  I am lucky to be able to have one and so very grateful for the talent that decorated it.

            This year will soon be over.  I am grateful to be alive, healthy, and happy surrounded by love.

Green Light

Just like the traffic signal, this sigil of a saying has one purpose:  To let someone know it’s okay to proceed.

When I worked in Hollywood, ‘green light’ was the ultimate phrase anyone anxious to begin a project wanted to hear.  It was final approval.  Few in the industry are allowed the privilege to confirm whether something is green lit or not.  You either had the money to green light a project or you were the spokesperson delivering the message.  No matter where you were in the hierarchy of the industry, you anticipated hearing the phrase, ‘green light’.

Some in my business never want to hear it.  I know I don’t.  In my line of work, it means someone in the hierarchy of the gang structure has given the okay to commit murder.  I recently learned that members of the southern California gangs operating outside of California were given an automatic green light to get shanked.  

A shank is a makeshift stabbing weapon.  Prisoners make shanks out of anything that’ll maintain its shape long enough to be shoved into someone else.  An inmate will use a glass shard to work off a piece of furniture, sink, toilet, or whatever else over a period of weeks, even months.  They’ve been discovered in every hiding place you can possibly imagine, including rectums.  For people who do not read, this craft is one they spend their time perfecting.

I’d been working an OIS (Officer Involved Shooting) in an area just north of Dodger Stadium when I witnessed a sudden shift in the attitude of the officers around me.  Since I was the only civilian, I questioned the nearest person in uniform.  He proceeded to tell me that the Mexican Mafia had just given the green light to kill a police officer.  I was suddenly relieved and comforted by the fact I would not be mistaken for one from any angle or distance.  

Although the order was never carried out, we were forced to wear our bulletproof vests before traveling into that particular area for months after the incident.

Over the years, I’ve learned that everything good can easily be twisted into something bad.  I now know what a simple, innocent catchphrase means in the minds of those hell-bent on wielding power over life and death.  I am, however, keenly aware that I too wield power over my own life; the only one with any real authority to green light a positive attitude. 

Unrequited

When what you do for others is not returned in kind or reciprocated, it is considered unrequited.  Not a day goes by nor a crime scene worked where this does not apply to what I see.

Occasionally, I’ve had to listen to a few suspects.  If an investigation goes to trial, a suspect becomes known as the perpetrator or “perp”.  Somewhere between drivel and well thought-out scenario is a thread of unrequited emotions and actions that I just can’t seem to understand.

Some time ago, I began to excise toxic people from my life.  Most people understand this as keeping their boundaries intact.  Many children are never taught that it’s okay to say “no” to those who violate their sense of security or body.  They grow up, not mature, into someone who figures it’s their turn to violate the boundaries of others.  In the midst of their quest to grow up, they falsely latch on to the idea of gaining respect no matter who pays.

In the deeper section of the southern-most division of LAPD, I took a call for a 187.  That’s code for murder.  A 664 / 187 is attempted murder.  It can get a little weird when an “ADW” gets thrown in.  That would be code for assault with a deadly weapon.  

Keep your sharpened pencil to paper my fellow psychotic writers.  Sorry for the flourish and divergence, but according to a study conducted by the Karolinska Institute in Sweden, writers are highly likely to become unhinged.  And here I thought I was immersed in beneficial therapy.

Gangs are organized in somewhat of a military fashion.  They have a command structure that tapers down in rank, ending with foot soldiers.  Two of these foot soldiers were having an argument about whose gang was better.  Both gangs were designated by the street numbers they were formed on.  Only a few numbers separated them; their blocks of origin within walking distance.

I took overalls in a small apartment with some close-ups of a blood soaked couch on one end.  After I had completed the ‘hurry up’ aspect, it was now time for me to wait.  In this job, I spend a lot of time waiting.  Gang detectives arrived from another division and soon began to discuss, at length, the birth, relationships, and now death of the gang member who sat on the shabby couch and verbally violated the boundaries of another.  

If reputation is life and death, then it had been considered justice in the eyes of the shooter.  I’ve learned to let a lot of things go in my life, including excoriation later exonerated.  Yes, I allow a person who lies about me to get their comeuppance when their time is due.  This young man could not.  Barely in his early teens, he shot dead his teen cousin for something he said.

I try to place things into perspective when it comes to wants.  I’ve seen enough people in their last weeks and days of life to know one thing.  When you are lying at death’s doorstep, the thought of that fast car you never bought or the big house you could never afford isn’t one you contemplate.

Life is much shorter than we think.  I know that much.  If I am fortunate enough to go gently into that dark night, I will be grateful for holding on to the same thoughts and values that were as important in my life as they were in my death.  Needless to say, I do my best to let ‘unrequited’ go.

The Dark

Do you ever see darkness fill the light?  No, it never does.  Light, however, fills the darkness, chasing it away like the scared thing that it is.

I bring light with me wherever I go.  I have to bring at least one flashlight since most of my photography is at night and the lights are not always on.  The bright flash from my camera illuminates an entire room to such a degree that it looks like daytime work.

I’ve had things come out in the final print that were not obvious during moments I floundered around, trying to catch my footing; writings or stains on the walls you’re glad you didn’t touch, and something else I’m not allowed to talk about yet.  Let’s just say some things get missed.  I’m glad that particular job didn’t come back to bite me.

Going to sleep after a long day is a big part of the darkness for me.  There are times when I just dither about, looking at cat videos and finding geological stats on things like the Marianas Trench that I’ve long since forgotten.  

Experience has brought about some new fears for me.  I try to tamp them down to plain weariness. Experience is the best survival tool anyone can have.  Unresolved traumatic experiences have the opposite effect.  They rob your life of the ability to truly live.

I received a call to photograph a house that had been tear-gassed in order to remove its occupants. SWAT, our Special Weapons and Tactics team, has an awesome array of less than lethal techniques they use to safely detain distraught people.  They’re really good at it.  It’s one of the things about them that never seems to make the news, but greatly impresses.  

Fresh tear gas is not my idea of fun.  My anxiety attempted to take me over as I came up towards the house.  I reminded it, in not so gentle a fashion, just who was in charge.  Me.  I bring the simple light of documentation to a scene.  I rest on that ideal a lot.

The simple truth is photographs don’t lie.  I fill the void so often created when truth and sincerity are absent.  I carry light.  So can you.