Kate Hackett
Being a police officer, especially a good police officer in light of all the accounts of police brutality, can be an extremely difficult job. The things that first responders witness are often beyond a layperson’s imagination.
Thanks to Redditor u/ilkersever’s question, “Police officers of Reddit, what was your ‘oh s***’ moment?” we can see just a little bit of what these service people go through.
The post went viral and we grabbed some of the best responses for you.
1. Drowning
The kid drowned at a local pool so I had to tag along with the ambulances for an investigation. I got there first and saw his father holding him crying and my heart sank. I ran over there and tried to perform CPR to the best of my ability for about 10 minutes before the ambulance arrived… he woke up right as it pulled onto our street. I preceded to visit him in the hospital and now he swears he wants to be a police officer.
2. Two cops gave tickets
I’m putting this story in just to lighten the mood. I observed this, I’m not a cop. Two cop cars were rounding the corner of an intersection, in opposite directions. They crash but were going slowly enough that no one was hurt. They both got out of their cars, laughing, pulling out their ticket pads, and started writing each other tickets.
3. Defense of Battered Women
A law prof in Australia spent 20 years as a cop before becoming a lawyer and eventually teaching. In explaining the battered wife syndrome defense to murder, he told a story of a call to a little old lady’s house where she had said on the phone that she had [taken out] her husband. Before this incident, he didn’t really understand why it existed. Why doesn’t the woman just leave? Why doesn’t she just go to someone else’s house?
Prof shows up at the door and is greeted by a little old lady saying ‘come in, would you like some tea?’ He goes in and she starts putting some cakes on a tray and pouring tea. He wonders if she’s all there.
He asked, “so you said that you [took out] your husband on the phone, would I be able to see him?” She directs him to the living room where the old man was on a lazy boy chair, bottle in hand, and a tomahawk in his skull. Meanwhile, the old lady is asking if he takes sugar or milk in his tea.
The prof said at this moment he realized why the defense of battered wife existed. The drunk old guy had been beating her for years, controlled all the money, and didn’t let her have friends. She had nowhere to go even if she left him. So on this day, after saying he was going to beat her if his sports team lost, she took matters into her own hands.
He said this was the moment he realized that sometimes there are situations where life doesn’t make sense and people take the only way they can see.
4. Motorcycles are death machines
Not me, but my friend is a cop. He pulled up to an accident scene once involving a motorcycle. Gets out of his car, starts walking over, and sees the guy’s helmet. Figures he’ll be nice and bring it over to the guy. Well, as it turns out, the guy was still in the helmet.
5. Robbed a bank
Not me but my grandpa was on the California Highway Patrol for 20 years.
He always told the story of how he pulled over this guy for a busted taillight. My grandpa asks him for his license and registration, and the guy says, “how’d you catch me so fast?”Grandpa said the hair on the back of his neck never again stood up half so fast. Turned out the guy had robbed a bank not five minutes before.
6. Dead
Ex-cop from NSW Australian here. A guy once passed away in a motorcycle accident. We went to deliver the message to his girlfriend. After reading the collision report the truck driver said he just pulled straight in front of him like he deliberately was trying to take his own life. She was not answering so we forced entry. The shelves of the fridge were on the kitchen floor. Opening the fridge we discovered multiple pillowcases with her cut-up body inside. That was certainly an ‘oh s**t’ moment.
7. Suicide
I pulled up on a teen sleeping in a vehicle at the end of a country road. When I ran the license plate, I found out that he was reported as a runaway. The doors on the vehicle were locked, so I knocked on the window to wake him up. Once he woke up and realized what was going on, he shot himself in the mouth with a rifle he had hidden under his blanket. Rough way to start my shift.
8. Little kid
Just checked onto my shift. As I turned my patrol car on, my radio was in a mid-broadcast about an accident just outside the city I work in. I voluntarily checked in route to help out the best I could. While heading there, I was informed that it was actually closer to the next city over but that I would still be the first one there. I was then told it was a head-on collision. I arrived on the scene about a minute later. It was in fact a head-on collision. 5 people from one vehicle were not wearing seatbelts. All 5 were fatally injured beyond any measure. There was nothing I could do. A doctor showed up on the scene shortly after me. Nothing he could do. I watched 2 adults and 3 children [pass away] in front of my eyes. The 6-year-old little girl just stared at me unblinking as she passed… I still get emotional.
They were students at our elementary school. I knew them because I routinely go to that school just to see the little kids and give them junior police stickers, take pictures with them and let them play with my gadgets and police car. I went to the memorial service that the school put on for the girls to pay my respects. Their father was there and didn’t know who I was or that I was the first one there or what I saw. He was talking to another father, clearly in between denial and anger phases, about how he wished he knew what officer it was on the scene so he could [take his life] for not doing anything and why didn’t he do anything and blamed me for their [passing way]. That was really hard to hear. I wish I was a superhero and could have used magic powers to save those poor children. I’m sorry little ones. You deserved to live your lives.
9. Don’t hit a cop
My brother was hit by a drunk driver on Interstate 30 in Fort Worth in July 2017. Went flying, laid there for a second, and then got up and arrested the guy who hit him.
10. Kid helper
Got a call for an emotionally disturbed person. Arrive on scene and a 350lb man built like an NFL lineman is passed out of on the floor face down. His wife says he suffers from PTSD from the first Iraq war and that he was an army ranger. He had been drinking heavily. His son is on scene and about 16 years old. The man begins to wake up and proceeds to smash his forehead into the ground, repeatedly. We call for an ambulance. A small pool of blood begins to form on the floor. The wife grabs a rag and goes to wipe it up when this guy’s head jerks up real quick, his face contorted in rage. He grabs the wife by the neck and throws her clear across the room onto the couch. We immediately jump on him but he is preternaturally strong. There are four of us and we are each fighting one limb.
The kid jumps in and helps us get two sets of cuffs on him because one set was not wide enough to connect his wrists behind his back. I ride in the ambulance to the hospital with him while he glares at me angrily reciting his military registration number and telling me I won’t get any information out of him and that I’m a towel head (I don’t remotely look like I’m from the region). The entire ride I hope that he doesn’t break out of the cuffs. If I’m being honest, I’m not sure we would’ve gained control of him if the kid hadn’t helped.
11. Taser saved a life
My older brother is a cop. He got a call about a [disturbed] teenager behind a school with a knife. He rolled up to the spot and when the kid noticed him he immediately started hacking at his own neck with the knife. My brother sprints over to him and tases him. Saved the kid’s life.
12. A real bad dude
Former Paramedic.
Known former gang member, and seriously bad dude who was suffering from epilepsy. It was known that when he was postictal (after the seizure) he would “revert to his gangland days” and anyone in uniform he wanted to fight. Hey look, ambulance drivers wear uniforms.
Got a call to his known address, me and my partner are the first to arrive on the scene. I already had the Valium and Versed drawn up and was ready to hit him with a “knock you out” dose. As I got to the door his mother (a very sweet lady) was hollering he’s coming to!!!
I jumped on top of him and with all my might hold him down and rode him like I was on the Pro Bull Riding Rodeo Tour. My partner was able to get the meds into him IM which takes longer to work than IV so I had to do that for the next 5-7 min till Fire showed up. I was exhausted and not really wanting to get my a*s beat rode that bull till 5 more guys took over, I rolled off and was just done.
3 hours later I ended up back at the hospital and he was in there. He apologized, always did, and said he never fought with anyone as tough as me. Thank god for being 40# heavier and a pocket full of mind-altering drugs.
13. Pregnancy
Not me personally (well, yes and no), but my mother is a police officer and she was pregnant (with me). She went to a call, on the last day before she starts her maternity leave, about a man who was locked in his house and threatening to [take his own life]. She entered the premises with other officers, and like an idiot (I love my mom but…) the pregnant lady takes point. She entered the bathroom where the guy was holed up, and he was sitting in a bathtub with a revolver pointed right at the door, so she yells “GUN!” and pushes the other officer with her back outside. When they finally claimed the guy and got the gun from him they checked it and said it looked like all the primers had been struck but since it was really old ammunition they didn’t go off. She went on her maternity leave and had me and said she almost didn’t go back because of that. Now she’s a police chief.
14. Drunk driver
Nothing makes you go “oh s**t” more than stopping an obvious drunk, feeling like you could be stopping a homicide in progress, to realizing you know the person…maybe you know them really well.
15. I hate this one
Not a cop, but an Animal Control Officer. Got a call about a family dog that had been attacked an hour ago by something wild. Got there to find said family dog’s skin rotting off with most of it gone and complete with maggots due to massive infection. Later found out it was from either a chemical burn or boiling water poured on the dog. Two. Weeks. Ago. The dog was taken to ER and euthed immediately due to only viable skin being skin on the dog’s head. The family still insisted it was a wild animal and it happened that night.
I have no faith in humanity.
16. Pets in a crash
Former paramedic here: I responded to a crash on the highway that required the extrication of the driver. I hop in the back seat and hold c-spine as the fire starts taking off the door, cutting posts, etc.
The driver starts asking where Mollie and Fred are, and if they’re ok. I’m confused because she was the only occupant of the car. I ask her if she’s talking about the other car and she says “No, they’re my pet tarantula and snake.” I look in the floorboard and there are the remains of two terrariums, but no Mollie or Fred.
17. YUCK
My husband has been a police officer for over 20 years. One night he was patrolling the downtown area when he noticed a purse someone had left behind. He opened the bag to check for id and found a turd. Some lady [pooped] in her handbag and left it behind. He’ll talk about autopsies and burnt bodies, but that is the one story he would rather forget.
18. Haunting
As a rookie, I was responding to an alarm at the restaurant that was supposed to be “haunted by a woman.” The first officer that arrived was an older officer that didn’t do much and didn’t even get excited on the radio. As soon as he arrived he asked for a second unit in a high-pitched tone. As I pulled in he had his shotgun out and he was leaned up over his hood. My first thought was “ oh s**t someone is breaking in “. When I ran up to him and asked what was up. All he said was as he pulled up and his lights hit the building a woman jumped off the roof and disappeared. He was clearly shaking. I and another officer checked the building and found no evidence that someone had been there. It made an impression on me and I never went back to the restaurant at night without another officer.
19. Hit
Was at a traffic stop. My Sergeant came and backed me up due to having to possibly tow the vehicle. My Sergeant’s vehicle was behind mine and we were both in the right lane. My Sergeant was sitting in his car and I exited my car to go talk to him. As I walked closer to his car I heard a vehicle’s engine rev all the way out but I couldn’t see it. For a split second, I knew what was going to happen and thought oh s**t but couldn’t react fast enough. The vehicle I heard smashed into the back of my Sergeant SUV which struck me, throwing me into the road. The driver was completely hammered and didn’t have a license. This happened last Sunday and I have surgery in a couple of weeks for my knee and my Sergeant has a broken back.
20. Leftover brains
Police paramedic- Went to a bad MVA. When I got home from work I noticed my boot was clicking on my kitchen floor. I thought it was a stone stuck in the tread but it was leftover bits of a fragmented skull. There was some brain in there too.
I decided to trash the boots. I mean, they weren’t totally worn out, but then again I’m not scrubbing brain matter out of my boots at 5 am in my kitchen sink.
