Ride Along

I had the chance to go on a ride-along with the local police department this weekend. I was originally scheduled to ride with one of the other officers but at the last minute I got assigned to ride with Brian instead. It was a bit of a surprise, as they do not customarily get to have riders during their probationary period (the first 18mos.). But I was happy to get to spend the evening riding with him, especially since I hadn't seen him all day as I'd been at Disney on Ice with Carissa.

Anyways, I rode with him from 8pm until 4am ... quite a bit longer than I expected to ride. At first he just pulled over people who had headlights out (surprisingly, a LOT of people drive around with one headlight out), those who didn't stop at a stop sign or other minor traffic violations. But later on in the evening (or morning, as it was after midnight) he headed to the only place in town with traffic this late - the highway. We rode the highway for a while and he pulled over a few people. Nothing exciting. Yet on one of his trips he clocked someone going 12 over the speed limit and decided to pull them over. Come to find out, it was a drunk driver. He did the field sobriety tests and located some drugs in the vehicle. I hung out with him long enough to watch the breathalizer test and while he took the suspect to jail. By then it was 4am and he had a mountain of reports to write. I was getting VERY tired so he dropped me at home and I headed to bed.

I loved riding along with him and seeing exactly what he does. It gave me a sense of peace to see how careful he is, how he protects himself while on the job and how he takes bad people and things off the streets. I am so proud of him and all that he does for our community.