Patrick O’Donnell: 25 Years as a Milwaukee Cop with Stories You Won’t Believe

Is Milwaukee one of the toughest cities to be a cop in? Former Milwaukee Police Sergeant who spent 25 years on the force joins us today and he’s got some stories that you are going to find hard to believe.

We go over:

• If Milwaukee is a difficult city to be a cop in 
• What he’d change about Milwaukee 
• Several near death experiences on the job 
• Craziest call he’s ever received 
• How not to act with the police 
• What people get wrong about cops

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

Life and death stuff. Your brain just clicks into caveman mode. It either speeds up or slows down. And it slowed down for me. A lot of it is crimes of passion. Spur of the moment where you infuse booze, other drugs, really bad decision making. Here comes this car coming at us. This all happened in a blink of an eye. And I go over the hood and I wind up in somebody's front yard. I've got glass and metal in my hair stuck in my head, and I my first thought was Tommy's dead.

SPEAKER_04 0:42

Oh man. If there's something that you you could change about the city of Milwaukee, what would it be? Oh boy. Hey everyone, welcome back to Milwaukee Uncut. Patrick O'Donnell, former Milwaukee police sergeant who spent 25 years on the force, joins us today. And he's got some crazy stories that you are going to find hard to believe. We go over. If Milwaukee is a difficult city to be a cop in, what he'd change about Milwaukee, a few of the uh near-death experiences he had on the job, the craziest call he's ever received, which was um shocked me how not to act with the police. I'm sure some of you could use some of that advice and what uh what people get wrong about cops. It was a it was a really cool episode and was grateful to have Patrick in. Before diving in, I want to thank our partners for making Milwaukee Uncut possible. We'll kick it off with Nicolai Law, the Midwest law firm injured. Get Nicola and Russ and the team. We'll take great care of you. That is Nicola. Next, we've got Drink Wisconsin Bleed Beverage Company, Best Vodka, brandy, and canned cocktails in the game, available at bars and liquor stores across the state. And now, available at Amfam, make sure to grab an old-fashioned in their corner bar, located in right field. And last but not least, our good friends over at Annex Wealth Management. If you're looking to get your finances together and have a goal that deals with your money, your earnings, your investments, go talk to the experts at Annex. They have an amazing team ready to listen and help you with your personal goals. That is Annex Wealth Management. Know the difference. All right, let's dive in with Patrick O'Donnell. Hey everyone, welcome back to Milwaukee Uncut. Today we're sitting down with a former Milwaukee police sergeant who has seen pretty much everything you're not supposed to see in the ensemble. Patrick O'Donnell has spent 25 years or spent 25 years on the force before retiring. He has authored 11 books. Yes. 11 books, his latest titled Police Stories, The Rookie Years. He has a podcast, Cops and Writers. He's got some stories that are hard to believe. Hard to believe, we'll put it that way. Really excited to have you in today. Thanks for reaching out. It's great meeting you. And thank you so much for your 25 years of service on the on the force as well in Milwaukee.

SPEAKER_01 3:16

Well, thank you so much. And I'm super excited to be here because this is local. You know, all my books, the background is Milwaukee. And I love to be here at a podcast, and you guys are doing a great job in Milwaukee. You know, and it's just I've done a bunch of national stuff. I've done TV, and it's just so much fun to come back to the you know to Milwaukee. That's given me so much through the years.

SPEAKER_04 3:40

Yeah, I'm I'm excited to have you as well. We've never never had a cop or former cop on the on the show. We've had some firefighters and some vets and first responders, but never a uh never a cop. We get a bunch of emails and submissions and stuff, and I saw yours come through, and I'm like, yeah, that sounds awesome. Let's get let's get this guy in here. So uh yeah, welcome. Welcome to the show. Um, what was the moment you realized you were gonna be a cop and did anyone try and talk you out of it?

SPEAKER_01 4:11

Well, I grew up in Chicago. Please don't hate me. Yeah, I am from Illinois. Are you a Bears fan? I am Walter Page to the good start. Are you a Cubs fan, Sox fan? Oh, no, I don't like the socks, the Cubs. I know, I know, but I am a Brewers fan because I love to see the hometown win. Because if the hometown wins, that brings in more revenue. It's you know, it's good for the economy. You know, it's just a good thing. I love to see the brewers do well, unless they're playing the Cubs, then that's different. But I I will say this growing up, Walter Payton was my hero. You know, I I grew up through the years where the Bears were absolutely horrible. Every year was a new quarterback, it just was terrible. And 1986 rolled around, and I'm just like, oh thank God, finally, you know, it's like yay. But I have gone to a Packer game, I've been to Lambeau, which I think everybody should at least once in their lifetime. That's so iconic, it's so neat. Just that whole vibe there is really, really cool.

SPEAKER_04 5:17

It it it is it is magical there. We we um we go to pretty much every game. We don't go into the games, our our interview content just it's it's a uh it's a gold mine talking to the tailgators there. It's so much fun. And like, you how's the opposing fan experience there? I'm guessing you're wearing Bears gear. I did not know you didn't.

SPEAKER_01 5:37

My ex I wouldn't the last time I went there, I was with my ex-wife who was a Packer fan. Okay, okay. That's not why we got divorced, but maybe I don't know.

SPEAKER_04 5:44

Maybe that's legitimately enough not to wear Bears gear, and you still got interesting.

SPEAKER_01 5:50

Yeah, I I did not wear Bears gear. I still had fun, and I even went to an away game in Detroit when they were playing at the old uh was it the Silver Dome or the Silver? Silver Dome, yeah. Yeah, in Pontiac. Yep. And I I gotta say this, we're all wearing, I guess I wore Packer gear because you know I'm like, all right, I'll rub it. It's good when the home team does well for the economy. And I gotta say, the Detroit fans were horrible. Oh my god, they're throwing ice balls at us and stuff, and I mean we're tailgating, and like you people suck.

SPEAKER_04 6:22

Yeah, usually, because we'll always talk to opposing fans when we're up there, and usually they're surprised at how Green Bay fans treat them right in a friendly way. Like it was funny, we went to the Eagles game in the Philadelphia. The dirty birds, yeah. The Eagles fans weren't weren't happy about it. One of them was like, This is so weird, I just need someone to call me a dickhead. And I was just like they were they they wanted some animosity and some fighting, but uh all the other fans seemed uh seemed very cool, uh cool with the the welcoming nature of Lambo.

SPEAKER_01 6:55

Well, I I did get a chance to see Barry Sanders live. That's cool. When I did go and I was TV and reels and whatever, don't do that guy justice. Um the cuts he was doing, my knees would be like in two pieces. I mean, and that was the later years. I can't imagine what he would be like in his prime. There's no way you're tackling that guy. It was just it's like Walter Payton. They were just gods, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 7:21

So you you grew up you grew up in Chicago, yeah. Very, very strict household, it seemed.

SPEAKER_01 7:27

Oh, incredibly strict, yeah. Strict Irish Catholic. Both mom and dad are immigrants from Ireland. Mom came over when she was about 11, dad came over when he was about 19. And you know, you're when did I want to become a cop? It's like, well, I would see the flashing blue lights of the squads going up and down the streets, you know. I'm like, well, that's pretty cool. Then we move from the inner city to a suburb, and this it's very Chicago-esque still. And one night, the the cops are doing a search warrant on our neighbors, they're executing a search warrant. And here comes the stack with the shield, they're all suited up, and I look in my backyard, there's a guy with an M16, the other guy's got a shotgun. I'm like, mom, mom, check this out. And she's like, Oh, Jesus, Mary and Joseph, what's going on here? And I was just like, I don't know. So we're just looking out the window, and these houses are so close together. And I'm just like, I wonder what they're gonna do. Boom, the door comes down, they're pulling people out, and I was just like, I gotta do this for a living. This is the cool thing they're getting paid for this. This is awesome. You know, I'm a little kid, you know, and I'm just like, wow, that and TV shows, you know, back then it was chips and SWAT and Beretta, Hill Street Blues, you know, all the all the classics. And I'm like, man, that just seems like such a cool job. So you want to go in and raid houses and chase down the bad guys? Absolutely. Drive a squad car really fast with the lights and siren going. I mean, what kid doesn't want to do that?

SPEAKER_04 9:05

You seemed from what I listened to, you seemed like a fearless individual growing up that wasn't afraid to ruffle some feathers or uh not knock a couple people out here and there.

SPEAKER_01 9:17

I do have an Irish temper, which I have controlled through the years. I had to. When I was a youngster, you know, my grandpa thought I was gonna go to prison. You know, I was like in eighth grade, he gave me a pair of brass knuckles, and he's like, You're gonna need these kids, you know. But yeah, I calmed down and uh yeah, look what happened.

SPEAKER_04 9:39

So, when did when did you officially join the force and how did that happen? Where where was it? Was it in Milwaukee when you first joined?

SPEAKER_01 9:47

Yeah, um, what happened was when I was in a freshman in high school, my dad got a job transfer to Whitewater. So the whole family moved to Fort Atkinson. We found a house in Fort Atkinson, and I went to high school in Fort Atkinson and then went to UW Whitewater, graduated from there after getting kicked out a couple of times. But hey, I still graduated. That's what matters. Yeah, exactly. And I floated around doing all kinds of Joe jobs. We moved to Madison. I lived there for six years, five, six years. And I loved it there. That was just a blast. To be a young person. I grew up in Madison, that's a good town. Oh, to be a young person and live in Madison, that's just that's yeah, that's a lot of fun. Well, what jobs were you working there? I was a night manager at IHOP. How did that go on university? I got into more fights at IHOP than I did in 25 years of being a cop. I did in one year, every night was a battle. It was drunks, street people, you name it, and there was a mental health, an outpatient mental health facility a block away. So you literally had like crazies coming in that were just off the chain. So I did that, I sold cars. Sounds worse than the Walgreens on Brady. Yeah, very much so. But yeah, I did that, I sold cars, I bartended, I did whatever I could do to pay the bills, and I took the test when I was 26 for Milwaukee, and it took four years to get on.

SPEAKER_04 11:25

Really?

SPEAKER_01 11:25

When I took the written test, there was like three, four thousand people there, and that was just one of them. Competition was fierce for how many jobs. I don't know, four or five hundred, maybe? Really? What's it what's it like today? Polar opposite. They're begging people to be cops. You know, Milwaukee never did lateral transfers. Say you're a cop in Shorewood, you know, you've you know got like five, six years on, Milwaukee will pay you a bonus to come over to Milwaukee. We never, ever did that. It was unheard of. I mean, when I I started in 1995, January 16, 1995, and we were supposed to be at 2,000 sworn, and I think we were down to about eight, 1700, 1800. I don't even know if they have 1100 now or 1200. I mean, but the numbers are diminished quite a bit. Why why is that? And did that happen overnight? It didn't happen overnight. A big I think it's multi-tiered. I when I joined, it was you'll do your 25 or more, then you retire. And that was kind of the idea for my generation of you know, you go to college or you go to trade school, you get a job, and you work that job forever, and then you retire. I think job hopping is a lot more accepted now. And it's like, yeah, I'll do this for like four or five years, and something else interests me, I'll do something else. And you know, 2020 didn't help. You're one YouTube video away from going to prison or losing your job or whatever because some weak knee politician just bends to political wins. So that's that's a tough position to be in. Social media's hurt. I'm guessing. Oh, terribly, yes. You know, you'll see a video that looks horrific, and you're only seeing like four or five seconds of it. You don't see what happened for you know, like two or three minutes before that, or after. So that you know as well as I do, you can paint any picture you want and manipulate when it comes to video. And that's what you see a lot.

SPEAKER_04 13:39

Right. So this this is probably the the environment we're in now, is probably the toughest environment to be a cop, would you say, with everything going on in the in the in the media and social media?

SPEAKER_01 13:49

It doesn't make it easier, right? But when I was brand new, you know, picture this 1995. There was Vietnam vets that I was working with on days shift. I mean, I wasn't days, but I worked overtime all the time, you know. So they'd be like, kid, why the hell do you want to be a cop? You know, like this is the worst time ever to be a cop, you know. Blah blah, we were able to do this and that, and yada yada. And I'm like, really? But you don't miss what you never had, right? So, like the new cops that are out there now, they think this is normal. Yeah, so for me, I mean, I saw a lot of evolution going when I first started. We hand wrote all of our reports, we had carbon paper. You know, the the big thing was you went and bought your own carbon paper and you hid it in your locker because the stuff in the assembly was just garbage. You know, you're using white out and green out, and everything was written by hand. Yeah, we didn't we had one computer in the district. There was no computers in the cars. Now it's like completely different. There was no body cameras. There was when I started, there was no tasers.

SPEAKER_02 14:57

Really?

SPEAKER_01 14:58

Oh no. You just had to do what you had to do.

SPEAKER_04 15:04

Spe speaking of, I know you had a uh in in interesting welcome on your first week or so. Oh yeah. For first day or night, maybe.

SPEAKER_01 15:12

Uh, it was the first week. So I'm on field training. And for those that don't know, you go through a six-month academy where you know you're they run your butt off, you know, they scream at you, you learn a bunch of stuff, you salute everything, including the fire extinguisher, you know, whatever, you're marching around, you know, you're doing whatever you gotta do, you're getting all the basics. And they let you loose in a district. Hey, you're a cop now. And I went to district five over at Fourth and Locust, and my first FTO was Reggie, and he was fantastic. This guy was awesome. Just I couldn't ask for better. I had I was very blessed. I had great FTOs, and you do six weeks with one FTO on a shift, so I did six weeks with him. Then they flip you to a different shift. I went to early power, which was 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. with Paulie, and he was fabulous as well. But I'm on the wagon with Reggie, and we get a call at seven o'clock in the morning for a stabbing, and we're like, and it's funny because Reggie just gave me this speech and was like, you know what? I've been working you really hard. He said, We've been working till afternoon every day. He says, I want to go home on time. And I'm like, whatever you want, boss. You know, you're you're the captain of this ship. I'm just along for the ride. He says, All right. So of course we get the call. The dispatcher's like, Yeah, you know, take the stabbing. It was by 17th and no 12th in Galena in that area. And they give a description of the subject, and it's like, okay. So we're bebopping down there, and sure enough, there's dude with a butcher knife, and he's wearing a white t-shirt that's like got blood all over it. And just out in the open, just running, yeah, just running with a knife like this out in the open. 7 a.m. broad daylight. Yeah. Yeah. So my FTO slams on the brakes. I almost go through the windshield. Yeah, I open the door, I draw down on him, and he's running at me with a with a knife like this. Not away from you, at you. At me. And I I got my gun, and I'm like pointing it at him. I'm like, oh shit. So my finger's going to the trigger because you never put your finger on the trigger unless you make you want to you want it to go boom. That's every every gun has a safety. It's your trigger finger. You're not gonna have a discharge unless you're squeezing Mr. Trigger. So I'm like, I start prepping the trigger. I'm gonna I'm aiming for center mass. And I'm like through your head. I'm like, well, that was a quick odd career. Yeah. You know, what, a week? This is all I get out of this shit. I'm like, damn, this this kind of sucks. But you know, there's all kinds of things going on biologically with you. There's auditory exclusion, your hearing is almost gone.

SPEAKER_02 18:03

Really?

SPEAKER_01 18:04

Yes, this is all scientifically proven. You get tunnel vision. These are all the effects, and there's time distortion. So I've talked to guys that have been in similar situations, and it's like life and death stuff. Your brain just clicks into caveman mode, and it either speeds up or slows down. And it slowed down for me. And all of a sudden it's like I'm like, oh shit, here we go. And you know, I'm like, police drop the knife. And he looked at me, and I looked at him, and I think he could tell I was probably more scared than him. My eyes were just like saucers, like, ah, and he's just like, oh shit. So he drops a knife, goes prone, we hook him up, and I'm like, oh thank God. So we take him to the back of the wagon, put him in. My FTL looks at me and says, Usually they're running the other way. They're not running at us, they're running away from us. I don't know. I think this guy was in shock. What was going on? So we go to the crime scene by now. Homicide detectives are there, etc., etc. The med unit's there, and the lieutenant's like, hey, get a dying declaration from this guy. It ain't looking good. Paramedics are like, he's circling the drain fast. So he's in the back of the med unit, and I'm like, dying declaration. I think we had one class where we talked about this, but I'm not exactly sure what. But this is the real deal, you know. This is not, you know, playtime. This is not, you know, role playing. And I'm like, I'm in this med unit, that's what we call our ambulances that are MFD. And they've got his feet up in the air, they got two IVs in them, and they're squeezing the bags. And I'm like, well, I'm no doctor, but I have a feeling this is not going well. And I'm like, dude, you're gonna die. Who killed you? And he's just gurgling. And the paramedics are looking at me like, hey, want to cut us some slack here? We're trying to save this guy, you know. And it's like, all right, we go to the trauma room at Freighter. And if you're ever injured badly, there is no better place to go to. They are amazing. I want to tattoo it on my forehead. Take me to Freighter. It is bar none, the best medical care you're gonna get. You know, they they see it all. You know, like army surgeons, you know, around Desert Storm and all that, they would go to Freighter and train because where else are you gonna get all these gunshot wounds and traumas? Is you know, they're a level one trauma center. If the president's in town and gets shot or anything happens to him, that's where he's going. You know, it it is amazing. But anyway, so they start working on Guy, and I'm amazed. I've never seen anything like it except like on TV. And there's a small army of techs, nurses, doctors, and they all have their own specific jobs working on this guy. And I asked the doc when things started calming down. I'm like, hey, uh, is he gonna make it? He says, Shit. He said, if it was you or I we'd be dead. This guy'll live to 100. And I'm like, oh, okay.

unknown 21:14

Woo!

SPEAKER_01 21:15

Flat light, he's like, so they jumpstart him, they get him going again, they do this three times. He crashes three times. You know, this is like way over an hour, they're working on him. And then finally, the doc the last time he crashes, the doctor grabs his scalpel, opens up his chest, breaks, gets a rib spreader, and starts doing open heart massage. And I'm from me to you. And I'm like, so that's what the inside of a person looks like. And I'm like, I cannot believe this is happening. So he he expired, he died. They did everything humanly possible to try and save this guy, but he died. And they're like, and it was just dejection. Everybody was like, You know, it's like a team losing the Super Bowl or something. You know, they're all these are people, you know, and they're all just so eventually, you know, I I call my boss, I say, yeah, now it's a homicide for sure. You know, etc. etc. So my FTO and a detective comes, and then the um investigator from the medical examiner comes because they take custody of the body, and then you know they take it down to the morgue. So we're all walking out, and Reggie looks at me and says, You know what this is all about? I'm like, no, he said, that was his brother that stabbed him, and he stabbed him over the last hot dog. They were fighting over the last hot dog.

unknown 22:41

Jeez.

SPEAKER_01 22:42

You can't make that stuff up.

SPEAKER_04 22:44

No, I just doing my research on YouTube. It seems like a lot of these crimes are committed over very small items to an extent. Some of them. Some of them, yeah. I've listened to a story about like how someone was basically killed over twenty twenty dollars. Oh, yeah. Or a pair of sneakers. Stuff stuff like that. It's not a hey, this guy what I would think is this guy's uh 50 grand in the hole or something, or 100 grand in the hole, you know, something like that.

SPEAKER_01 23:17

Or a lot of it is crimes of passion, spur of the moment where you infuse booze, other drugs, really bad decision making, and a very low threshold for you know what the quality of life is. You know, how do you value life? And there's places where the value of life is very low.

SPEAKER_04 23:40

Do you see that a lot in in in Milwaukee comparative to other cities? And is it more difficult to be a cop here than other places?

SPEAKER_01 23:50

It depends where you are in Milwaukee. You know, it not all Milwaukee is terrible, and even in the most terrible neighborhoods of Milwaukee, it's mostly good people that live there. It's just that obviously the dynamic, you know, like, hey, this guy just got killed over a hot dog, that's what sticks out. Or, you know, that's what makes the news. That's that's where we're that's where you're going. Right. Absolutely. And it's really a false narrative because, like I said before, you know, there's people that live in these neighborhoods, they feel like they're trapped. You know, they're scared to go outside, they're scared to have their kids go outside and play. It's it's horrible. So that's why we need the bullies.

SPEAKER_04 24:32

Um, speaking of death, what is the closest you've ever come to death? Oh boy. There's been a few times.

SPEAKER_01 24:39

Um any that stand out. Uh two different occasions I've had bullets whiz by my head and hit like the building next to me. And I couldn't return fire because I didn't see where it was coming. You know, it was just like, you know, one was there was a riot at in front of Throttle Twisters, which was at Fourth and Center. It's uh a biker bar. And it was New Year's Eve, and things were getting way out of hand. What year was this around? 97, 98. And it was completely off the chain. It was just one fight on top of another fight, and then the gunfight, then the gun plays started. And you know, you're talking hundreds of people in the street, and there was like maybe 10 of us. If it's probably like 10 degrees out, too. Oh, yeah. But then you know, you hear rounds being popped off, and that's not unusual, but then all of a sudden it's like they're getting closer and closer, and I'm like, whoa, one hit right by my head. So there was that. Then there was another time where um I was on Oakland, like 2400 block of Oakland, that's like two blocks north of North Avenue, and we just broke up a college drinking party. It was not a big deal. Standard. Yeah. And I was one man that night, and there was another copper that was one man. And we just went in there and said, hey guys, you know, we're getting complaints, just you know, chill out, you know, just under the radar, all right? So if you were cool with us, we never wrote him tickets. We never, I'd be like, whatever. So, of course, you know, we're talking afterwards, and his car was facing north, his squad car, and his right leg was inside the car. He was a tall dude, he's like 6'4. The officer you were with. Mm-hmm. He's got his elbow on the roof, and we're just and I'm facing south, and we're just shooting the shit. You know, we're just talking. And I don't know what alerted me to it. I just heard this engine go, I'm like, I'm like, Tommy, jump. So here comes this car coming at us. This all happened in a blink of an eye. And I go over the hood and I wind up in somebody's front yard. There was like a 68 or a 69 Volvo went right where we were standing. Peeled the door. The door was hanging like on one hinge, and it was peeled back like a sardine can. It was a drunk. And I've got glass and metal in my hair stuck in my head, and I my first thought was Tommy's dead. There's no way he survived that.

SPEAKER_04 27:24

Were you two in the street in the car?

SPEAKER_01 27:26

Ran you ran you. Yeah. So I go running over, and I'm fully expecting to see Tommy parts. The guy took off. But thankfully, there was another cop that saw the whole thing and took off after him and got him. But I'm like, okay, there's gonna be Tommy parts all over the street. He's he's gone. And I look and he's in the passenger seat. This guy's six foot four, like 250, in the fetal position. He's like, go get that son of a bitch. And I'm like, yes. So I run to my car and I'm shaking so bad I can't get the key in. I'm just like, I took two hands to put the key in. But this is after you went over the hook of a car. And I'm just like, oh my gosh. So yeah, I'm going the wrong way. I'm just a hot mess. I was I completely lost it. I'm just like, what the F is going on here? So that was close. And then I had another instance where I had a recruit. I wound up being an FTO, you know, later on in my career. And we're at Hillside Housing Project off of, I think it's 12th, oh, maybe like one or two blocks north of Juno, like on the west side. And we get a call again, seven o'clock in the morning, boy girl travel. And it's like, all right. We get a ton of those. It was a boyfriend and a girlfriend having an argument outside, and I'm like, does some someone else does a third party call you on that? Okay. Because they're being really loud, things are getting heated, and they're afraid that it's gonna get physical. So we go there, and I'm with a trainee. This is his first week with me. And I'm like, hey, dude, you know, like, chill out, everything's gonna be okay. So I'm like, get her information, I'll get his. So we did, he they're cooperating, both of them are, but there's something about him, and again, this guy's just a monster. He's like six foot three, six foot four, a solid 250. And I'm like, hmm. And the recruit that I'm with, he's yeah, I'm 5'9, he's probably like 5'8. And I'm like, all right, and said, you know, run these guys. So it's typical you run them for warrants, you know, make sure they're telling the truth about who they are, et cetera, et cetera. And I um I just got a weird feeling. So I'm like, hey, sir, you know, I'm gonna pat you down, make sure you don't have any weapons. You don't have any weapons on you, do you? No. It's like, all right. As soon as I touched him, his shoulders go up like this, and he gets stiff as a board. It's called resistive tension. And it's like, this guy's gonna fight. His fingers, his hands started balling like this, and I'm just like, oh shit. Before I could think, he spun around. Now the fight's on. He's trying to take me down, and I just went lower. And I had a lot of martial arts training, I was boxing, I was, and so fighting wasn't foreign to me. And you know, you you use what your strengths are, and I'm lower to the ground, I have a low center of gravity, so it's like, okay, you're gonna have a hard time taking me down. And then I look and I feel, and he's got his hand on my gun, and I'm just like, oh shit, this guy wants my gun. So I take him, my hand, my left hand, under his chin, and there was these big um metal uh mailboxes on the outside of these buildings, and I just tackled them like I couldn't get them on the ground. And so I just pushed him up against this building as he's trying to get my gun, and I just start banging his head, the back of his head, into these mailboxes until he went unconscious. So his head is split open, and I'm just like, my heart's going a hundred miles an hour. I forgot that I had a trainee. I forgot that there was another person there, and she's screaming at the top of her lungs. Turns out he was on parole for armed robbery. He was, he just did, I think, three or four years in Wapan. He just got out and he violated his parole. So he was going back to Wapon for the for the stretch. He had like another four or five years to go. So me and my recruit were the only two things in between him going back to a maximum security prison and staying, you know, free a free dude. So once he woke up, he's in the hospital. He's like, Yeah, I was gonna take his gun and kill both of them.

SPEAKER_04 32:04

How do you uh how do you process something like that after it happens?

SPEAKER_01 32:08

Oh, my heart was beaten like a rabbit. It's beaten right now, thinking about it. Do you do you go into work the next day? Oh, absolutely. Okay, yeah, you'd I mean, there was a mountain of paperwork we had to do. Yeah. And I'm training this guy, and the recruit that I had with me was really good. He was a sheriff's deputy for like three, four years. He'd worked in the jail the entire time, which is a great training ground for cops. And now I think he's a captain or an inspector. He's done really well for himself, which makes me really happy, Erwin. Love you. And uh yeah, but he could write really good reports, and you know, you're go you just went through all that, and it's like, yeah, are you okay? Yeah, I'm fine. And you can't stop. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 32:58

That's crazy. What is um maybe not the the scariest or closest to death, but what's what's one of the weirdest calls you've ever received?

SPEAKER_00 33:06

There's so many.

SPEAKER_04 33:08

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SPEAKER_01 33:53

Any stick out, any anyway, stick out, maybe. You know, like in my book, you know, I put in it's like one of the reasons I I wrote the book was you're always gonna, what's the craziest thing that ever happened to you as a cop? And there's so many. But one of the strangest was I was a sergeant in District 2, actually around here. And I was working 7 p.m. to 3 a.m. and I heard a call for a dead body come over. It was in a warehouse, actually, right down the road, that I'd forgot. I've driven by it a hundred times, and I'm like, okay. So my cops get there first, and I'm with a partner, which is odd for sergeants. Usually sergeants didn't ride together, but he was new, and I wanted to kind of show him the ropes kind of thing, you know, the geography. And we uh are getting there, and my cop gets me on the cell phone. He says, Sarge, you gotta see this shit. And I'm like, Well, yeah, I have to because I'm the boss and there's a dead body. I have to respond. No, you don't understand, you gotta see this. And I'm like, Okay. So we get there, there's a woman probably in her late 50s, early 60s, sobbing, and it looks like her adult son is comforting her. There's yellow tape up, and I'm like, okay, we'll see what this is all about. So we go inside, and this warehouse didn't have electricity, and it was a dirt floor. I'm like, okay, there's a bunch of like cars, and there was like a tractor in there, there's all kinds of weird stuff. So they're like, Sarge, Sarge, give me. I'm like, all right, all right. So here's this van with double doors in the back. They got their flashlights out. It was like watching the showcase thing from the price is right, they're gonna reveal. So yeah, it's like, okay, you ready? You ready? I'm like, yeah, I'm ready. So they open the doors, and I'm like, oh boy. Here's a guy on all fours, his pants and his underwear are down to his ankles, and there's a bottle of jolly good soda shoved up his ass with a pick and save bag with strings. It looked like a parachute. And he was dead. Rigamortis had said it. And we all looked at each other and I'm like, He was dead? Yes, very dead.

SPEAKER_04 36:21

How did he die?

SPEAKER_01 36:23

We either it was a heart attack, he went on a uh crack cocaine bench, and he was also doing heroin. He's an older cat, retired, and decided to start doing all these crazy drugs. So he hires a prostitute to shove said bottle of jolly good soda up his ass while they're doing this. That was his kink. And that's how he went out. That's how he went out, and his wife is like, I want to see him. I'm like, not like this. You're not gonna see him like this. Oh, he had a wife, too. Yeah. So, you know, the medical examiner the medical examiner has investigators that comes out to any scene like this, homicides, you know, bizarre deaths, you know, whatever. And one of my favorites was Jen Penn. I loved her. She, no nonsense. When she was smoking, she kind of was like, What do you got, Sarge? And I'm like, Oh, I've got something for you, Jen. Here we go. Come on over here. And she's like, I've never seen anything like this before, and she'd been around, man. And I'm just like, neither have I. So we do our thing. They actually found the hooker, they found the prostitute, and she explained the whole thing, and it's like, okay. So a week goes by, and I'm in a different homicide, and Jen shows up and she said, Sarge, you remember that guy with the jolly good soda? And I'm like, How could I forget? You probably can't unseat the sort of thing. Yeah, exactly. I said, Jenny, how could I forget that? And she's like, They did the autopsy. Now they don't remove anything like that until they do the autopsy. If they're dead, dead, you leave the body the way it is, and you bag it up and off to the morgue it goes. So she said, You'll never guess what they found. And I'm like, don't tell me a hamster or a gerbil. And she said, nope. A bottle of hot sauce. He used that bottle of Jolly Good Soda, just shoved the bottle of hot sauce with the cap off. Oh my god. And I'm like, you can't make this stuff up. I'm like, oh my god.

SPEAKER_04 38:34

Sounds so painful, too. Oh. And he paid somebody to do it.

SPEAKER_02 38:39

Oh my god.

SPEAKER_04 38:41

Wow. Wow.

SPEAKER_01 38:44

Yeah, I don't know if you can follow that one up. Yeah, I can't. I mean, I've seen all I've seen death in all kinds of ways, but not like that.

SPEAKER_04 38:54

Oh man. Oh man. Speaking speaking of arrests, if someone is in trouble with the cops, not like they just, you know, shot someone and you need you need to get them out. Is there a um is there a way they could minimize their chances of getting arrested and things they do to to escalate this?

SPEAKER_01 39:18

It's all situational. Yeah. You know, it's like, as far as like, say, you know, like the college party. If you're like, if you open the door and you're like, yeah, you know, there's some other okay. Bye. Have a good night. We got a lot bigger fish to fry, just keep it cool, okay, guys. Yeah. But if you're like, F you, you need a warrant to come in here, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And I'm like, oh, okay. You're gonna be that guy. I had something like that where over by UWM, and what happened was I get a 911 call. We have to go to 911. It was a 911 hang-up, and it was a female crying for help. Okay, we gotta go. Yeah, so we go, and it was coming from a crow's nest apartment at an older house, and the only way to get to this apartment was to go through the main living room. I mean, it was just a goofy setup, and they're having a big old party. So this kid answers the door, and I'm like, hey, I got a 911 call for upstairs. I have to go and check it out. And I'm with like three other cops. And he says, Well, you need a warrant to come in here. And I'm like, Not for this, I don't. And he's like, Well, my brother's a lawyer, and I know. And I'm like, dude, I said, tell you what, I'll be super cool about this. I'll give you 30 seconds if you got dope, if you you know you got a bong somewhere or whatever, just put it in the closet. You know, if you're drinking, there's underagers. I'm just gonna pretend they're not here. I it's a busy, busy night. We don't have time for these shenanigans, okay? No, you can't. And I'm like, so he opens the screen door and he starts shoving his finger into my chest. And I'm like, all right, time for you to go. So I literally grabbed his arm, flipped him over, he went airborne. I cuff him up, we go upstairs, she's just drunk. And I'm like, all right, this didn't have to happen, but okay. So I take him to jail, and he's sitting in jail, and I'm like, you know what, dude? If you just would have let me in, you'd be at home partying still. You'd be having a good time. Yeah, but no, you gotta be a moron. All right, that's fine. So, you know, I told the booker, I said, I just gave him a ticket, and he got to sit in a jail cell at District 5, which was really icky with real criminals. And while I'm doing all this, I hear over the loudspeaker like, hey, O'Donnell, you got a visitor at the desk. And I'm like, What? Nobody's visiting me, but okay, sure. Here's this guy with a camcorder. This is the 90s, the late 90s. He puts it on the counter. He says, just so you know, I'm videoing all of this. And I'm like, okay. He says, I'm representing, you know, blah, blah, blah. And I'm like, oh, are you a lawyer? Well, I'm going to Marquette, I'm pre-law. And I was like, you ain't no lawyer, buddy. You don't have a license to practice law. And I said, No what you just did? You just bought your brother more time in jail. I was gonna have the, I was just gonna cut him loose, but I said, you know what? He's gonna stay till nine o'clock tomorrow morning. And I said, and it's all because of you. And I'm gonna tell him that it's because of you. That had to feel kind of good. It did.

SPEAKER_04 42:32

I'm not gonna lie, man. It it felt awesome. Um, what do what do you think something is that people get completely wrong about about cops that would annoy you guys or any misconceptions?

SPEAKER_01 42:44

There's so many, you know, and I don't blame people for the most part because you learn everything from watching TV or you know, social media or whatever. You know, they're people. Yeah, they're gonna have their bad days, they're gonna go days without sleep, they're gonna have divorces, they're gonna have sick kids, they're gonna have whatever. They are human beings, they're not robots. So might they they might be a little short-tempered sometimes, yes, you know, or whatever. But probably one of the biggest misconceptions that I see and that really chaps me is in TV and movies, you see a cop get into an officer-involved shooting where they have to shoot and kill somebody, and like five minutes later, they're eating donuts and high-fiving each other, and they're back on the street. It doesn't work that way. You won't see the street for six months to a year while all this stuff is going on, and all this stuff is going on in your head, and you're being demonized, you're on the nightly TV, your kids are going to school, and you know, their little friends are calling, Yeah, your dad killed somebody, you know, blah, blah, blah. Your wife has to deal with that, your husband has to deal with that. It's a ripple effect, and they just sensationalize it. It's like, yeah. Yeah, no big deal, whatever, blah, blah, blah. It's a huge deal.

SPEAKER_04 44:02

And I'm guessing in 99.9% of those cases, the cop did not want to kill that person.

SPEAKER_01 44:08

No, but no cop goes to work and said, Boy, I really hope I smoke somebody today. That is the very, very last thing we want to do. It changes your life forever. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 44:20

And peep people don't really even even a lot of the stories you're telling me, I'm like, the fact that you have to have to do that, which is really admirable work, which is needed to be done, and then go back to work the next day or file the report, and it's I you know, I don't realize it as a normal civilian, all you guys kinda all you guys go through.

SPEAKER_01 44:40

Well, in everybody has a different experience for the most part, but there are a lot of similarities. You know, with my podcast, I I talk to cops from all over the world, and we share a lot of the same stories, a lot of a lot of the same heartburn, a lot of the I mean, yeah, it's you're a hundred percent right.

SPEAKER_04 45:00

Um is the if there's something not you you could change about the city of Milwaukee, what would it be?

SPEAKER_01 45:10

Oh boy, I guess it it would be like anything else, it shouldn't be so politically driven. It shouldn't be one person, i.e. the mayor or whoever, that is shocked or outraged and they just have a knee-jerk reaction. The department's the same way, they're guilty of sin for that as well. You know, the police chief, you're a politician, you're not a cop when you get to that level and you're trying to appease so many different people. You know, if if I had a magic wand, there'd be a lot more cops out there. There would be cops doing what they're doing right now, and there'd be a lot more neighborhood cops. I had bicycle cops, they were fabulous, they were awesome. And I had them working at night, I had them working during the day, going down Lincoln, Mitchell. You know, I had beat guys that they knew everybody on that block. They knew everybody in that whole area. I remember one time I was working in a different district, I was looking for a guy for armed robbery, and we had a name. I go, I'm like, I know who knows this guy. I go to the beat guy and say, hey, do you know you know Joe Blow or whatever? He says, Yeah, he works out at that boxing gym boxing gym from three to four. I'm like, solved. You know, I just a lot of kids don't have positive role models, male positive role models. And a lot of times it's the cops. If you talk to the cops that grew up in horrible neighborhoods in Milwaukee and later on became cops, a lot of them will say, Yeah, my positive role model was the neighborhood cop, or the the the cop that would just you know stop and talk to me for five minutes. That's that's huge. That's really important.

SPEAKER_04 46:50

Do you think that's especially a problem in in Milwaukee? I know um I do I've been doing Big Brothers, Big Sisters for like the last couple years. That's great. Yeah, it's been yeah, it's been good. My my uh my kids, single mom household, um, yep, dad, very in and out of the picture, most mostly out, as far as I know. And I know just in Milwaukee Metro alone, I believe there's 600 kids on the wait list looking for a mentor, essentially. And that's just that's just in Milwaukee. And some will try and get into the program in you know it starts at six, which is when I got my kid. It's the youngest age, they let people in, and someone will some people apply and get to 18 and not get get anyone. And um, yeah, not to derail this and plug that organization. But if anyone's worthy, I mean, yeah, no, that's been doing it. It is a uh good way to make an impact. And I know just from research, I know especially boys, I'm sure girls too, but I think boys, especially if they don't have a male role model, they'll just go completely off the rails.

SPEAKER_01 47:55

Well, now the role model is a neighborhood drug dealer. Right. You know, they see the bling, they see the car, they see, you know, yeah, and there isn't a lot of thought about future me in these neighborhoods. They don't think about it as like, okay, I should go to college or I should pick up this trade and you know, get married, have kids, you know, blah blah blah. That's kind of like a lot of them are just trying to survive on a day-to-day basis in their fam families too.

SPEAKER_04 48:21

Absolutely. Yeah, so one one thing, one thing would be yeah, getting more of those positive role models on the streets.

SPEAKER_01 48:29

Yep, and more cops. You know, when I went day shift, I worked nights for 17 years. When I went days, I had to go to community meetings. And I remember my captain is like, You ever been to one of these? I'm like, No. He said, It's kind of like Jerry Springer. You're gonna have some Jerry Springer moments. You know, there's gonna be outrage. There's gonna be somebody that just they love screaming and yelling and you know, blah, blah, blah. He said, just get, just be ready for it. And I'm like, okay. And every time I went to one of these meetings, it was, we want more cops. These are the people that are actually living in these neighborhoods. They want a cop like parked on their front lawn, they want their own personal cop. They don't want less cops. That's why I was like, defund the police. Are you out of your freaking mind? It's probably the worst slogan of all time. Oh my god. I was like, obviously, all of you screaming and chanting this, never lived in a bad neighborhood ever in your life. You've never been the victim of a crime, you know, blah, blah, blah. And I'm like, oh, this is so silly.

SPEAKER_02 49:27

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_04 49:29

Yeah, and as you were saying earlier, um I'd I'd I'd um get your take, but I'm guessing, you know, a very, very, very high percentage of cops are good people who do it to help the community, and then you see a bad apple on social media for eight seconds, and that's what gets thrown out there.

SPEAKER_01 49:49

Nobody hates a bad cop more than a good cop. You know, that that's what that all boils down to.

SPEAKER_04 49:55

Do the bad cops get filtered out at all once they're in the in the system due to good cops, or is it Yeah?

SPEAKER_01 50:02

I mean, there is a pecking order, and it's like, dude, not cool. Yeah, you know, it's like, no, this is not gonna fly. You know, if you have this anger issue, if you have this whatever issue, A, don't do it in front of me. B, maybe it's time for a career shift because this ain't the right one for you. You know, you're talking about you're a community servant. And if you can't wrap your head around that, you're there to serve the the public. You're not there to serve a police chief or a mayor or whoever. You're your bosses literally are the people. You're there for them. And if you can't wrap your head around that, if you feel you're too important or whatever, again, time for a career shift.

SPEAKER_04 50:41

Um, any before I let you go, any closing thoughts or uh or stories you didn't share? There's so many. We could we could have you back sometime.

SPEAKER_01 50:50

I would love that. I would absolutely love that.

SPEAKER_04 50:52

Well, um, it was amazing having you in today, and and thank you so much for all you've done for the community and the new book. The new book Police Stories, The Rookie Years. Um, if you enjoyed this this episode, I'm sure you will enjoy that. And I'm guessing you could find it on Amazon. Yes, it's on Amazon, and I'm writing the sequel as we speak.

SPEAKER_01 51:11

Love it. More to come. Yep. Thanks so much. Thank you so much.

SPEAKER_04 51:16

All right, huge thank you to Patrick for coming on. Before signing off, just want to thank our partners who make the show possible Annex Wealth Management, Nicola, and Drink Wisconsin Bleed Beverage Company.