Writers Police Academy

KN, p. 189 “Fifth Anniversary Thank You from the Kerrians”

 

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It’s with great pleasure that we thank you, the readers, for hanging out with us for five years.

 

We’ve taken some really amazing trips to American Civil War battlefields, endured fog and pouring rain on both American and international golf courses, been trapped in elevators, survived bomb scares, witnessed bloody crime scenes, and lived to tell the tales.

 

Some intriguing people have agreed to do interviews about their jobs and in the process, have opened the eyes of our readers far and wide about the rigors of law enforcement in its many forms.

 

Police Academies, Fire Fighter Academies, Emergency Medical Training Schools, Firearms Training sites, Criminal Investigation Facilities –  have all generously allowed us to take photos and chat with the instructors at length. Fascinating stuff.

 

We’ve met with Visiting Detectives – an assortment that included a psychic detective, a vegetarian detective, and a time-traveling detective from the 1800s. Sheila chimed in while they worked on puzzling cases with me. The Vegetarian Detective brought brownies. Yum.

 

Kerrian’s Notebook, Volume 1, which included stories from 2011 and 2012 no longer available on the website, was published in response to the readership that wanted the (over 50) stories from the first year collected into one ebook. Don’t have your copy yet? Click on the link and find it at Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00HI6YBDG

 

You’ve made the journey fun. And then some.  🙂

During the years, we kept track of which posts were the most popular, which ones you kept visiting over and over again. For research? For another laugh? To prove a point? For some of you, all three. Here is the result.

 

Click on the links and take a look at your Top 10 Favorite Kerrian’s Notebook posts in reverse order thru 2016:

 

  1. “Who are the Texas Rangers?” (p.144)

 

  1. “Are all handcuffs yellow?” (p.68)

 

  1. “What does a Texas Ranger do?” (p.145)

 

  1. “How big is that jail cell?” (p.51)

 

  1. “Kerrian’s Favorite Chocolate Cheesecake.” (p.45)

 

  1. “100 Ways to Die an Unnatural Death.” (p.100)

 

  1. “What does a firefighter wear?” (p.119)

 

  1. “I Like Pie.” (p.67)

 

  1. “How many bodies at the scene?” (p.87)

 

And the most popular post?


  1. “How to become a Texas Ranger.” (p.146)

 

Thank you, one and all!  🙂
Next time you’re in town, give us a call. We’re always happy to chat about the latest trip or the trickiest case. If you’re lucky, you might even meet one of the Visiting Detectives. There’s always a pot of coffee on and a piece of pie just begging to be eaten.

 

*Fingerprint photo taken by Patti Phillips at SIRCHIE, in Youngsville, North Carolina.

 

 

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KN, p. 180 “What happens in the ambulance?”

 

What Happens in the Ambulance

We’ve been seeing quite a few ambulances in the neighborhood lately. It’s human nature to wonder who is sick or hurt and to see more than one a week at certain houses is more than a little worrying. We are lucky enough to live within four miles of the hospital, so response time is pretty quick – 7-8 minutes from the time the call is made to get help. But, we have two Senior citizens living close by and sadly, the sirens have been blaring every few days. A couple of times, the crisis was managed at the house and other times, our old friends made the trips to the hospital.

 

What does a paramedic actually do? Suppose the patient is not at home, surrounded by friends and family?

 

The paramedics are responsible for pre-hospital care. They do all they can to keep the patient alive until the person can be seen by a doctor. They cannot act on their own, however. After hearing the patient’s Vital Sign numbers, the Emergency Room doctor at a health care facility (usually the closest hospital) gives orders to the paramedic via phone or other device about the procedure to follow. This is no easy task, because the EMTs/paramedics must communicate not just the numbers, but also the state of the patient’s appearance and what may have caused the problem to begin with. A medical history isn’t always available (as at an accident scene), and the reason for a sudden loss of breath sounds or heart beating may not be apparent.


What Happens in the Ambulance

A paramedic’s first job is to keep the patient alive, and that may mean getting the heart started again, getting breathing going again, and/or stopping blood loss.

 

There are protocols to follow.

 

One person is in charge of the case at the time. He/she delegates the jobs for the rest of the team to carry out.

 

It is a two person job to clear the airways, monitor the patient’s vitals and administer whatever drugs are necessary to get breathing started.

 

If the heart has stopped, there is a mathematical procedure to follow: 32 chest compressions followed by two breaths, with the team switching positions every five minutes. Ever try to do this? It’s not easy to keep the compressions going for five full minutes. They must continue the process until the heart beats on its own or until the ambulance reaches the hospital. They keep “working on the code.” If they can get started on the chest compressions within three minutes, then there is a greater likelihood that oxygen will get restored to the brain.

 

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But, that’s not all that is happening on the ride to the hospital. Blood sugar and other levels are checked while in transport. These days, an ambulance is a mobile intensive care unit. It’s the paramedics’ lab. Tablets are proving to be invaluable, because they can deliver more information to the doctor – including cardiac readings – and then the doctor can make more informed decisions about the transit care.

 

Ever take a ride in an ambulance when you weren’t a patient? I got to do that once and I was surprised to find out that the siren wasn’t nearly as loud when we were sitting inside. I also discovered how much bouncing goes on in the back of the ambulance. Roads are not as smooth as you might think and some neighborhoods have speed bumps installed that slow down the ride considerably. But, one of the guys revealed that they train while the ambulance is moving – including inserting lines for fluids! They anticipate the normal bumps and rocking that occurs and develop a rhythm for doing their jobs. A bit like getting used to working at sea.

 

Because there may be a shortage of doctors available to give medical orders (they may be busy with another patient from an accident, or another heart attack victim) some regions of the country now have paramedics that are so highly trained that they can work under a doctor’s license without contacting a hospital. This requires special certification – not every paramedic is allowed to do this.

 

The average pay for paramedics is a little over $40,000 a year. What kind of training is needed? The first step is Emergency Medical Technician (EMT) training – about 150 hours (9 weeks). After passing certification tests and working in the field for at least six months, then the candidates become eligible to attend Paramedics school – an additional 1200-1800 hours of training (perhaps two years). Then, you can work in a fire station, in a hospital, or anywhere that employs a paramedic – even at a resort. Of course, you have to be able to lift sick and injured people, have a stomach for working with broken bones, nauseous patients, and bloody accident scenes. Think you can do that? It’s a rewarding career if you can.

 

A related article shows what an EMT might do at the scene of an explosion, before the patient ever gets into the ambulance. The event was a simulation, but the pictures may be too intense for some people. Click here to read “How many bodies at the scene?”

 

 

*Photos by Patti Phillips

 

 

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KN, p. 117 “Officer needs assistance!”

 

 

 

 

Arrests are rarely neat and tidy, or take place with little resistance from the suspect(s). If the charge is for a misdemeanor, too many parking tickets, or a problem with overdue child support, the suspect might cooperate. But, hardly anybody actually wants to go to jail.

 

If a car is seen weaving across lanes on a busy road, an officer might have cause to assume that something is wrong. Drunk driver? Distracted driver swatting at a bee in the car? Texting driver? Any of these scenarios require the officer to be on the alert, but might not require an automatic call for backup. He/she is facing what is called an Unknown Risk. The officer will follow protocol and call in the plate number or use his onboard computer to research outstanding warrants and ownership of the car. If flashing the patrol car light bar gets the driver to pull over so that the officer can investigate the reason for the odd behavior, then the stop may just end with a warning or a ticket.

 

Sometimes suspects are caught in the act of a committing a felony and they try to make a run for it (perhaps after a bank robbery or a drug deal goes south) hoping they can lose the cops in traffic or on deserted back roads. “Suspect fleeing the scene,” may be called in if it’s witnessed, and officers in pursuit are facing a Known Risk. It becomes a High Risk situation if guns are involved. The chase can continue beyond city limits, as long as it is an active pursuit.

 

Once the chase ends, the officers need to control the situation as much as possible, keeping their own position and the suspect’s position clearly in mind at all times.

 

Safety procedures the officers might follow if warranted:

If the chase ends during the daytime, the officer will angle the patrol cars to block off streets and people for their own protection, getting as close as possible to the suspects to control the developing situation.

 

You give up cover if you are not positioned behind a door, so the officers will try to stay behind a car door while the scene unfolds. Bullets will pierce doors, but at least a car door will slow the bullet down. Hopefully, the officers will be wearing bulletproof vests, but even a notebook will slow down a bullet, although not by much. There are degrees of cover and there are very few times of absolute cover.

At night, the officers will create a curtain of light – that is, shine lights on the suspect’s face so that he/she can’t see the officers.

Officers in patrol cars generally carry a shotgun because it commands respect. People pretty much stop in their tracks when they hear the sound of a shotgun being racked.

 

It is essential to get as much information about the people inside the car as possible, before any further action is taken. If there are tinted windows in the car, the officer will try to talk the people out. If the officer can’t? Then, officers are trained to wait the suspects out. It’s usually only a matter of time before the occupants of the car will make a move.

 

Officers will risk the K-9s if they need to, in order to encourage the suspects to get out of the car or even to stay put.

 

If the officer feels the trunk needs to be investigated, he/she will have the suspect pop the trunk so that the officer maintains control.

 

 

Once the suspect gets out of the car, the officer will have him/her kneel or lie on the ground to be cuffed.

 

 

 

The suspect needs to be frisked before being placed in the patrol car.

 

The inside of a patrol car is bare bones for a reason. Suspects are often sick inside the patrol car, or even go to the bathroom in there. Yup, right in the back seat. This plain design makes it easier to hose out and also cuts down on places to hide sharp objects, etc.

 

Once the suspects have been cuffed and frisked, the officer places them inside the patrol car.

 

There were no guns in the hands of the suspects in this scenario, so the situation was handled fairly easily and was resolved in about an hour.

 

Please Note: none of the gals in the photos are criminals. They were attendees at the 2013 Writers’ Police Academy and were helping to re-enact a ‘Known Risk’ stop, complete with yelling and back-talk to the officers. Good sports, all!  🙂

 

Many thanks to the instructors at The Writers’ Police Academy (2013) and the volunteers from the Guilford County Sheriff’s Department (NC) who gave so generously of their time during their days off.

 

 

*Photos taken by Patti Phillips

 

 

 

The re-enactment was conducted at night and demonstrated how difficult it is for anyone to see what’s happening (officers or suspects) while the action unfolds. After I took the photos, I used a photo correction app to adjust the lighting, so that you could see the positions of the people and the cars.

 

Compare the two versions of the same image below.

#1 (the original image) shows how dark it really was outside.

#2 was adjusted so that you can see the demo.

 

 

 

 

 

 

          #1                                                                                                           #2

 

 

 

 

 

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