Officer Tanner is known around here as "Sweet Tea" or Sweet T". Sweet Tea had an interesting journey to become a cop for us. He worked in our jail for a few years. He then got hired at another local PD where he worked for 5+ years and ended up being a Motor Jock (traffic unit on a motorcycle) for a bit.
Tanner then lateralled back over to GPPD as an officer. He has been an officer with us for about 2+ years now. He just recently got to dayshift patrol as well.
Sweet Tea is an interesting character for sure. He shares some wild stories working in the jail and some interesting experiences as an officer as well. Plus, with a name like Sweet Tea, you know he has good stuff to say!
#firstresponders #mentalhealth #policestories #firefighters #firstresponderpodcast #wellness #police #policepodcasts #coplife #grandprairie #grandprairiepd #grandprairiepolice #thinblueline #firedepartment #investigations #honorguard #swat #fto #intern #jiujitsu #bjj #mindset #lpc #wellnessunit #wellness #emdr #counseling #therapy #therapist #mentalthealth
Check out our department and come join us!
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Officer Tanner is known around here as "Sweet Tea" or Sweet T". Sweet Tea had an interesting journey to become a cop for us. He worked in our jail for a few years. He then got hired at another local PD where he worked for 5+ years and ended up being a Motor Jock (traffic unit on a motorcycle) for a bit.
Tanner then lateralled back over to GPPD as an officer. He has been an officer with us for about 2+ years now. He just recently got to dayshift patrol as well.
Sweet Tea is an interesting character for sure. He shares some wild stories working in the jail and some interesting experiences as an officer as well. Plus, with a name like Sweet Tea, you know he has good stuff to say!
#firstresponders #mentalhealth #policestories #firefighters #firstresponderpodcast #wellness #police #policepodcasts #coplife #grandprairie #grandprairiepd #grandprairiepolice #thinblueline #firedepartment #investigations #honorguard #swat #fto #intern #jiujitsu #bjj #mindset #lpc #wellnessunit #wellness #emdr #counseling #therapy #therapist #mentalthealth
Check out our department and come join us!
https://www.grandprairiepolice.org/Join-GPPD/Benefits
Spotify:
https://open.spotify.com/show/7iXLlroCbjAnjPAIT2zbEO
iTunes:
https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/gppd-podcast-grand-prairie-police-tx/id1647457129
Social Media:
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCGKcINWcNmiQWqoGebGbpug
https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100090391688925
https://twitter.com/gppd_podcast
https://www.instagram.com/gppdpodcast/
Welcome to GPPD podcast. I'm your host, nate. I'm a lateral transfer officer and I'm currently assigned to the investigations bureau.
Speaker 2:And I'm your co-host KD. I'm also a lateral officer and I'm assigned to the crime prevention unit. We're always looking for great men and women for the police department, but also we need dispatchers, animal control, code enforcement officers and detention officers. So if you know anybody interested, please, please, send them to grandpurepoliceorg. Get that information filled out so that you can apply.
Speaker 1:Don't forget to find us on social media we have Facebook, Instagram, TikTok and YouTube and, most importantly, find us on your favorite podcast platform. Subscribe, activate notifications. Leave us a five star review. Today you will hear from police officers, their lives and their stories. The accounts may be mature in nature and mature language may be used. Listener discretion is advised. Alright guys, welcome back to the next episode of the GPPD podcast. We are here with officer Tanner, the officer that I have not met and actually wasn't sure it was a cough and told us a few minutes ago I'm sure he's saying yeah, which is kind of embarrassing.
Speaker 2:No, it's not. But I remember the face. I remember seeing him in jail and I'm like man, he looks like he's 12.
Speaker 3:I still look 12.
Speaker 1:Like I was saying, that was kind of a good when you're 40 and everybody else is all beat up from night shifts and you're going to be like a solid look, like a solid 25.
Speaker 2:Yeah yeah, that's funny. Well, bro, we appreciate you coming on with this.
Speaker 3:Yeah, thank you.
Speaker 1:First of all, so he saw you in jail a long time ago.
Speaker 3:Explain that. So I started in the jail. Here I was working back in 2015 and started working in jail for about a year and a half and they still did the program where you could get your college, or you can get your college waived if you worked there for three years. I think it's changed since, but it's two years now. I think so, yeah, but yeah, after a year and a half I was ready to be a cop, so I went to a different agency that didn't have like the college requirements, right, and so yeah.
Speaker 3:I left back in, I think, 2016.
Speaker 2:Just like a young stuff. Oh, I can't wait, I can't wait, yeah, I was.
Speaker 1:I was impatient. Yeah, now was was hopping over there, or like once you made the decision to go over there was coming back, after a relatively short period, part of the plan originally, or did you just get there and realize it's not really good fit?
Speaker 3:Yeah, it wasn't a good fit. I mean it was a good department, it just it wasn't for me. So I knew how GP worked. I knew a bunch of officers and I was thinking about leaving over there and some of the old heads were there like if you're going to leave, you need to do it now, because I was about at the four and a half year mark. Any bit longer it's just getting too vested with the department. So just jump ship when I could and things worked out.
Speaker 1:What was, if you don't mind going into what were some of the differences that you notice. That's one thing we always kind of struggled to get across. It's like you get two very good departments, but just stylistically they're just different you know, call load, they're different.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I mean it's so it's. It was about half the size of here and that meaning that being said, you also have half the amount of officers, so the call load was pretty much fairly similar.
Speaker 2:Right.
Speaker 3:But it just didn't feel like I had the backing of the top top. And so they would do like the the month, not the monthly, but like the quarterly chief meetings or the annual chief meetings. And when you had asked like, hey, what's going on with pay? You know these other agencies are starting to make more and you're hearing it from you know the big man saying you know we're not going to make that. If you want to make that much, go there.
Speaker 2:Oh wow, not being told hey, we're trying to work for you. Thanks, chief.
Speaker 3:Yeah, it's a. It kind of kind of opens your eyes. So yeah.
Speaker 2:Did. Were you able to do it right along over there before you went over there? How'd you pick that department?
Speaker 3:So I did do it right along. It was between that department and Fort Worth at the time. Okay, that one just seemed more family oriented, just seemed like it was going to be a better fit for my family at the time. So I went with them and I mean, like I said, it was a good department, just wasn't for me.
Speaker 2:Yeah, did you only do patrol, or did you?
Speaker 3:So the last two years over there I was in motors so as a motor officer and really enjoyed that. Like wasn't my idea to be a motor jock at all, but I worked overtime shift in Fort Worth with the guys and it was a good group of dudes and they're like, hey, we got some openings coming up, you should put in. And it's like, nah, that's not me, yeah. And I ended up putting in for it and I loved it because that's the, that's the unique group within policing.
Speaker 1:We're like, when people tell us they hate cops and I'm like, okay, why? It's like, well, because it's a motorcycle Pulling, it's like, yeah, we hate them too. Yeah, yeah, they didn't even like them.
Speaker 3:Yeah, that's I wanted to. So when I was wanting to be a police officer, I wanted to get in for canine or narcotics, those are the two things. And then, after working patrol for the walls, like yeah, it's not for me, really, yeah. So I was just kind of going to do patrol for the wall and then got kind of pushed into trying to be a motor officer and enjoyed it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, now for our listeners motor motorcycle, motorcycle officers, yes sir, the ones that give you tickets when you're late traffic enforcement. Yeah.
Speaker 1:That's funny.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:You had, I mean you ever have people just go absolutely like anybody memorable, just go ballistic on you.
Speaker 3:Oh yeah so. So there's this one guy we were I remember exactly how I was working because we rode basically in pairs, okay, and this guy's flying on a motorcycle. He sees us and he dips in the neighborhood. My partner's like Well, you know is what it is. But he pops out like right in front of us, not knowing like the street over is where he's going to be coming out. So my partner goes, he pulls him over and of course he gets a ticket for speeding. I think he was going like 20 over and I'm sitting at a distance and I can hear this guy just screaming, cuss and yelling at him and then, as he yanks the ticket away from the guy and he starts to go and he rolls through a stop sign, flipping me off. So you can't do another traffic violation. Sunsafe went over there. I made contact with him and is even more of a show, just cussing me out, yelling at me and yeah, that was one of the more memorable ones.
Speaker 1:I had a guy one time I was working in traffic detail and do it seems like I like when I, if I write tickets for speed, I'm like 25 to 30 is my threshold, like where I, where I work. The guy like you're just, it's open and it's just they get going really fast. Yeah, I've realized the traffic detail requirements as far as like not tickets, like for activity and showing that you're actually doing something, are so loose that you literally can sit there for half an hour and not hold anybody over, just to make sure you have that breadth of not being too, too stringent. So I was waiting, wait, and I realized you'll eventually get people going crazy speeds. Yeah, pull this guy over. I mean just blatant, no excuse, what just, but just a complete.
Speaker 1:There's one and I gave him I could have written him, I don't even know how much. I only gave him the one I was going to anyway. And as I, as I handed to him the same thing, he takes it, he goes, I'm gonna pay this, puts it and drive and goes to drive off and then drops the ticket out out of the window. I'm like, okay, yeah, he do his haul away too. I was like okay, well, we're about to get a chase, and so I start heading back to my squad, and immediately when I get back to my squad, the channel goes from register traffic for something else.
Speaker 3:Oh so like.
Speaker 1:You know what? I'll be? The bigger man. It's your lucky day today. Yeah, that's what it is. Yeah, it's gonna be, it's gonna be fun.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so I'm gonna have to learn from you guys, cuz you pull some shit like that with me. It's time to go to jail.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3:Well, the, the motorcycle that was like right when Kobe was happening. So they're like oh yeah don't. If you don't, if you don't have a reason to take someone jail, don't you know? Just give them ticket, let them go about their day.
Speaker 1:So you know, it's kind of a weird, a weird time in general within I really had a bunch of Protocols and stuff for, like, making sure people didn't have to roll down their windows and all kinds of stuff. You ever have anybody just freak out about the COVID situation. Just refused to contact you.
Speaker 3:Yeah, so like I mean, I Was traffic and they're just trying to have us do the least amount of work, but they gave us these face shields, just like Sun visor face shield mask, and it was ridiculous and like walking up to no, no, no no, we had gotten in a car.
Speaker 3:So they said no, motorcycles. So then now we're two man in a car, close together. It didn't make sense, but yeah, we're in. That stuff was. It was ridiculous. But you know, people are upset like no, people are out here dying because of COVID. Y'all are out here enforcing traffic and didn't want to hand over a license and it made it rough.
Speaker 2:That's actually that's what you tell them Just press it up against the wind. Yeah, just scan it. Hold on, you get your ticket in a minute. Yeah, that's funny. All right, so you ended back over here With GP mm-hmm because you said you knew a lot of people here.
Speaker 3:Yeah, so I was. I was looking to leave and I knew People here. If I was gonna make a fresh start somewhere, at least come somewhere where I got some familiar faces around. Yeah, clearly not too familiar with y'all. Yeah yeah, so Start of the process here is pretty smooth and I got hired on and started the Academy in 2021 the lateral Academy.
Speaker 2:Oh, okay, I was about to ask would you have gone through the basic? But no, I'm into lateral and just so everybody knows, the lateral Academy. How long was it for you? Because it was short for me.
Speaker 3:I think mine was eight weeks. I think it's a little longer now because of all the out of state. I'm not too sure how long it is now, but it was eight weeks for us. Yeah, yeah, same six for us. Yeah, six, that'd have been nice.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I was. I was really on the fence about coming over because one of my big concerns is working in a smaller town. I want to be bored bored, like I knew the policies were more friendly. But I was like no point in being able to, you know, chase and have good policies and whatnot if you get there and there's no one to do that stuff with right right.
Speaker 1:But then I did my eye on there was. I was really on the fence now talking to Garcia. He told me about the schedule and I found out about the schedule, the family time, and then how long the Academy was, and I was like man, you're telling me in a month and a half.
Speaker 3:You back out on the streets, yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 3:Yeah done.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I like the schedule here. I'm just used to the Panama schedule. Are y'all familiar with that one? No, no. So it's like you work Monday, tuesday, then you're off Wednesday, thursday, then you work Friday, saturday, sunday and then your week flips. So now you're off Monday, tuesday, you work Wednesday, thursday, then you're off Friday, saturday, sunday, which it's a good spin on it, because you know you get to have every other weekend off, but at the same time, like someone says hey, you want to do something on this day in like a month. You're like hold on you know like counting down the week like in my off that week.
Speaker 1:You get it wrong. Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3:So I prefer this one because now I know every Sunday, monday, tuesday I'm working, you got something going on, it's gonna be no go.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so yeah, that's what. So mean Chief was like hey, your family is just important as everybody else's. So you know, and I've told the story time and time again but as a I'm gonna say a rookie officer, when you're two or three years on where we came from, you could literally do 15 years and then you'd be off Wednesday, thursday, that's yeah, that's no go.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, coming over here it's like no, dixon, you're, you're gonna be off every other Saturday and I'm like, are you sure I know you, the chief, and I don't know? Yeah that's where we came from, but that's crazy. A Panama schedule. That's what it's called the Panama schedule.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think. I had something similar to that when I was working warehouse stuff.
Speaker 3:really yeah, yeah, yeah but it was nice having the weekend every other weekend off. But yeah, the the trying to plan stuff out as what it was like the biggest hiccup, yeah.
Speaker 2:That's a hit a and sound like I gotta do algebra to figure out, yeah.
Speaker 1:No, not for all here. Yeah, yeah. So Back up a little bit. How'd you want to be in a cop? I just in military.
Speaker 3:Well, so there's like sophomore year I was taking one of those Career quizzes or whatever, and it came up as a bailiff and I was like I don't even know what a bailiff is and I'm like you Google in it and I was like security guard, like like the court, yeah school thing.
Speaker 1:Or like a Facebook quiz. No, this is no.
Speaker 3:It was a school thing.
Speaker 3:It was like like a. I don't even remember what the class was, maybe communications or something, but yeah. So I was like that's silly. But you know, I had always had kind of like a passion for police work because I had an uncle who's a police officer over at Grapevine and yeah. So I slowly started watching cops as I got Alex cool, that's cool and that's what joined me, that made me go to the Marine Corps, because I was like I, you know my job that I'm at right now it's not gonna really do well with Translating to police work. So I joined the Marine Corps, thinking that's gonna give me an edge, did it? I don't know, because I was in data networking, isn't like I did anything.
Speaker 3:It's super cool there, but I Just had a passion for trying to get into stuff like. There's some people at my bus stop though Do drugs, as like this stuff, I've seen it mess up lives. I've seen a mess of families and that's kind of what drove me towards it. It's like I want to be narcotics.
Speaker 1:I'm gonna be K9 what movie made you want or TV show made you want to narcotics specifically. No, no, no, seeing, like personally, like seeing how, how drugs I was just trying to get.
Speaker 3:you say training day, oh bad, yeah, no, no, no, no, no just personally just seeing some families get messed up with the drug usage. So Once I became a cop, I realized very quickly though narcotics and K9 wasn't my thing.
Speaker 1:So why do you?
Speaker 3:think that is, I don't know I so one of I made a traffic stop and you know, being a one-year officer, I got half a pound of weed out of this, this 19 year old kids trunk, and I was like, oh, that's cool, I got, this is pretty good amount. And a week later I saw him just walking shopping with his family and I'm just like, dude, I just arrested you, you're not like in jail, and just just constantly seeing the revolving door of resting people for meth being out at it a month later, just, I Don't know, I took my driveway from trying to put those people, these people in.
Speaker 2:So yeah, it can be disheartening, I think is the word. When you know somebody's up to no good, you arrest, you do your job, but you have to understand, or the listeners need to know. We're just a small part of a bigger Moving piece because, we can send them to whatever County and then it's up to a prosecutor or you know, charges being filed, and Sometimes things don't go our way.
Speaker 1:We'll just leave it at that, yeah you know, pardon parole boards, freaking Probation officers, that kind of stuff. Yeah, that's where I from, my, where I sit. That's where I see a lot of issues.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, that's easy you know, and I'm not throwing you know making accusations, but just from talking to Some of the people in the profession, them expressing their frustrations, I you know it's easy to have somebody say, okay, yeah, sure, here's a stamp you can get out and do your best. Try again, it's not your neighbor. Yeah, you know, it's budget, it is somebody's.
Speaker 3:Yeah, so that kind of turned me off from that and I was like I'll just do patrol and see, see if there's something else that comes up.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, so, but what? Is there any other unit that interests you besides like, like K9 and?
Speaker 3:Oh yeah, I want to get back with traffic. I'd like to be a part of the motor unit here.
Speaker 2:Oh cool, yeah. No, you want to ride a motorcycle today, yeah.
Speaker 3:I got recertified with the department last year, so no on today's weather. No, no, no.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's cold, but I mean to you, there are exactly zero grand per motorcycles on the road today.
Speaker 3:Yeah, the rain is coming. Yeah, it's pretty gross out yeah.
Speaker 1:Well, that'd be fun. I would think because motors are sometimes interested me as well. I just don't want to get divorced, so I don't do it, but I would think it would. My life at divorce means what I mean.
Speaker 3:For riding the motorcycle Right in the motorcycle.
Speaker 2:Yeah, like that. No, she said, don't ride a motorcycle.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, but didn't did not ever get boring.
Speaker 3:No, because I mean you go to accidents that kind of like change up the day Just going out there I after working it for a while and going to the accident scene. How some of these could have been avoided by people not just driving with you know cell phones speeding.
Speaker 3:I enjoyed it because it's like you would see, there are certain spots and, again, the city that I worked for was about half the size of Grand Prairie, so there are spots where we would work, where it would start to slow down, like if we sat there, you know, multiple times throughout the week and it was nice to see you know a change.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 3:So I didn't get boring, I enjoyed it.
Speaker 1:That's good.
Speaker 2:I'm scared of the accidents because or being in an accident on a motorcycle talk to one of the motorists here and he was like, oh yeah, when I took off, I guess the bite fishtail the song he was like, oh, I didn't see the gravel, and he laid it over. And I'm just like, ah, yeah, and I'm like, oh, no, sir, but you know it was my fault Like I don't care yeah.
Speaker 3:Yeah, if you're in a car, it wouldn't have happened, yeah.
Speaker 2:And that doesn't scare you.
Speaker 3:No, no, I know my wife's not really how, she was just rather happy to stay patrol or do something like CID or something like that, but it's funny because patrol.
Speaker 1:you always hear that from spouses Like yeah, don't do, don't do, swat don't do, narcotics don't do, motors don't do. But patrol is more foreign away the statistically speaking more dangerous.
Speaker 3:Yeah, cause you're responding to the call. Of you know you don't know what you're going to know.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, the domestics, yeah, those are the most dangerous ones. Yeah.
Speaker 2:Um, okay, so why would there marry kids? Yeah, what we got going on.
Speaker 3:So I got two boys. My oldest is 10. And then, uh, my youngest is eight.
Speaker 2:That's what I'm telling you and I'm glad we got these cameras. He looks like he's 20.
Speaker 1:I know.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:My oldest, that's my kid, he's 10. You're like what?
Speaker 3:Yeah, nope, that's awesome. I started at 19. So that wasn't the game plan at all. Um, but yeah, I have two boys and married, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:So and I always tell people, like you know, like now my wife is supportive, but my dad goes. You sure you want to be a police officer? That is 15 years in, over 15. Now what? About your wife Like is she supporting you? Is she you know what, honey, if you want to ride the motorcycle, I don't like it, but go ahead. Or is she like no?
Speaker 3:Well, so we uh so kiddos are from past marriage. Uh, so she she started dating me when I was already a cop, so that's kind of all she knows is me being in police work. She does miss the uh, Tuesday through Friday schedule because I've been going back to night shift back and forth, uh, with that, so she does miss that at times, but, uh, she's super supportive. Yeah, yeah, why would she?
Speaker 1:miss Tuesday through Friday.
Speaker 3:Cause I was off on the. I was off, uh, friday, saturday, or I was off Saturday, sunday, monday.
Speaker 1:Oh, got you. Okay, I was thinking off those days.
Speaker 3:Oh, no, yeah, I was off those days, so she, she misses.
Speaker 1:I can say you're okay, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:I want you off wall to work. Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3:So she misses that schedule, but she's super supportive, yeah.
Speaker 2:And you? You work nights for a short stint right.
Speaker 3:So since I've been here, I got. I got lucky. I got cut loose Um like a week into the bid and so they put me on days. So I had six months of days and then I went to two back to back bids on nights. So if I was on nights for a year and then days then got bumped back to nights and now I'm back to days.
Speaker 2:And with the numbers I'm pretty sure he's going to stay on days.
Speaker 3:I'm hoping so. Yeah, so like on the this last bid out of like the 120, I was like 72. I was fairly up on all the new people that got hired, cause I'm 6, 31 from a badge, and they're already in the 700s.
Speaker 2:Yeah, um. So for the people that are interested in applying, or lateral, lateral, lean over. Um, man, I think I was on nights, maybe a year and a half. Yeah, it was about a year, yeah.
Speaker 1:I think I went to the bike three ish. Yeah, so there's a lot of movement too.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you're just not on nights long Again we come, or we've seen offices in certain departments where it's like nobody was on nights for 10 years, unless you want to be.
Speaker 3:Yeah, there's some guys that enjoy it, yeah.
Speaker 1:Cause, like I know me, I was. Uh, if I'm on patrol again, I will very likely go nights. Um, I, I work my, I work my. It just it fits my temperament, my, just my approach. I like to do, I did six months on days and it was just not it's.
Speaker 3:it's a different beast, for sure, and you don't have the sun either. On nights it's a little bit cooler.
Speaker 1:Why are you saying that? Well, I mean it looked like I don't like this on yes. Actually I love the sun. It's just my skin doesn't, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:But no nights. Nights was, it was fun. Um, I don't know, I would like to see us. What do we call it? A swing shift, where, like you, come in at three with the sun up and then you get off, it's like it's dark and nobody's moving?
Speaker 1:Dude, if they, if they introduced a swing shift for patrol like uh, I don't care, especially like a 10 hour where it's like middle of the afternoon through early midnight hours. I don't care where, what position I'm in, I'll quit and go that shift like that.
Speaker 3:I think it would be pretty popular ship to go to.
Speaker 1:Yeah. That was cause working even working like for three to 11 or four to midnight at my old agency. Don't love that because you get. You get the daytime hours, you get some of that. The and then I said it before my favorite time in a squad car is that shift from days to nighttime and that that's just such a an awesome. Yeah, Sun's going down, it's just yeah Like yeah, like right around the time it's like starting to get slow, slow between, like major accents and stuff like that.
Speaker 1:And then you're you could then it's time to go home to midnight, two o'clock in the morning.
Speaker 3:I would take that in a heart.
Speaker 2:Yeah See, I didn't like it cause I had to keep up with shades and flashlights. I was in the same shift and I couldn't do it.
Speaker 3:Yeah, you leave them in the visor or something You're like Dang it.
Speaker 2:So I just started buying my shades at 7-eleven. I'm like you know what? I'll buy them for seven bucks.
Speaker 1:Oh dude, I get them warmer. Yeah, I can't.
Speaker 3:I can't get more. You get in the fight or anything you get them scraped up and not even like good excuse.
Speaker 1:good excuse like that. I'm just not that smart when it comes to sunglasses and I can't get them.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's funny. Well, chiefs, y'all heard it from us swing shift. Let's talk about it. Yeah, all right, tennis. So now that you've been here, so how many years all in do you have?
Speaker 3:I'm coming to Prada onto seven.
Speaker 2:Holy smoke yeah.
Speaker 3:Seven and then with the cause, the jail was also TMRS, so I'm at I'm at. I guess that technically I can retire in 12 years if I wanted to, but I don't know. I started here um 28. So I'll probably do 20 here and be 48. Let's see what. See where I'm at. Oh yeah, so 20, that'll put me at 20 years here with the department, but I think 25 years in TMRS.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so, um, just to get our listeners up to speed, we have a 20 year retirement. So some city well, I think most of them are different, but you just have to ask. But yeah, I we were one of the first that I knew of that jumped in and said you know what? You can go at 20. Now the numbers you know when you start talking about income and the payout and all of that. So, but if you play your cards right, 20 looks real.
Speaker 1:And it depends on the approach you take too, cause, like our department, offers so much city OT you can do a whole bunch of that. That's going to supplement your retirement. So if you want to work more in a shorter period of time, you can yeah, I'm very like a step or any of the city OT yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, um, so we do. Uh, as far as I know, they've had and I've been here almost nine years city OT is just, it's a lot.
Speaker 1:You know what I?
Speaker 2:mean it's like if somebody's calling in sick for a shift, then that person that also needs to be replaced, so you can get it in a multitude of ways. Yeah.
Speaker 3:Well, and they're, it's good too, Cause, like if you come in early enough to work, step and like hey, we're short people, you want to work some patrol? Like yeah, I'll do it. And then they're, they're super, they'll work with you too. Like look. I was only going to work till about two o'clock and I got to go pick the kids up. They're like. We appreciate your help.
Speaker 1:Just worked till two, so yeah, did they even do it on me? My current position, uh, one of the night shifts needs OT and I would always email the attendance, like, if y'all don't get anybody to cover it, I can only give you, like you know, four to six hours to spot the policy, but you know I'm down to work till 10 or midnight or whatever, and they didn't get anybody, absolutely Come on.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, yeah, it's good. Yeah, that's dope. And we can help in the detention center now.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah, which I did a lot of yeah, yeah, cause I didn't have to go through, like I worked there, so I understand how things work.
Speaker 1:So I did one of the training shifts and it was. It was fine and but then I had a bunch of other OT stacked up that I like for just pretty much all the whole month of January and the beginning of February, and if someone was at Epic waters and then that email came out saying they're canceling, like almost, I think, every, every shift I had, I'm like what? Oh so you working on Mondays, mondays, and Mondays, thursdays, whatever? I didn't realize those were the days I tend to snag.
Speaker 1:But, I guess it is Cause I checked and they're all gone.
Speaker 2:I don't know, I don't know why they did that but, it's their slow season.
Speaker 3:So okay, so probably summer they'll pick it back up, yeah, so we're in here something that's interesting.
Speaker 2:It's a little bit out topic but we'll talk about it. So we're about to have all these new businesses. So anybody not familiar with GP or Grand Prairie offer one 61. It's about to look totally different, and a lot of these business, businesses yeah, they need help. Yeah, so you know you talking about off duty. Oh, my goodness, it's going to be more than we can even keep up with. Yeah, you know, to the point where we outsource it, so, so to speak. Well, in the city is going to.
Speaker 1:I think the city is going to wind up staffing a lot of the just the general retail areas, which is why I got back certified.
Speaker 3:Yeah, oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, cause you'll be able to recall that that oh team.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so we needed um, I know like Bass Pro shops coming and ready's and dread is is coming, That'll be busy.
Speaker 3:Oh, 30 sectors Gonna be busy busy Jumping with all the apartments, all the retail.
Speaker 1:I was a year ago. I was the one of two detectives for 30s property. I couldn't keep up with it Then.
Speaker 3:I believe it, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:So yeah, Um, all right, tenant, we got to jump into this. So before we went live we were talking a little bit. Um first off, I'm gonna try to do what I left Tell everybody your nickname.
Speaker 3:Uh, it's, unfortunately it's sweet tea. Yeah, yeah, and you know, I've, I've, uh, I've gotten some nicknames, I've earned some nicknames, but I've that one just came up and uh wasn't a fan of it. Still, it's whatever. But uh, how that came about was Aaron Spear was talking to uh officer at the time, now Sergeant Wilson, they're at the pumps and he's like you know, just small talk before the weekend, hey, what you got going on. And he's like I'll be hanging out with sweet tea. He's like what? Wilson's like I, what are you talking about? He's like sweet tea. You don't, you don't know who that is. He's like no, who is that? He's like Tanner, that's what he goes by.
Speaker 3:I was like oh my gosh, so I'm not making it up on the fly, just like that, yeah, and so I get a message on the computer and it was like yo, sweet tea, and it's like what, and that's like what are you talking about?
Speaker 1:You know?
Speaker 2:and then I get a message from Spear saying I'm sorry.
Speaker 3:And so Sergeant Wilson's right next to me in the locker room and, um, he's like so, what's up? Sweet tea. I was like what, what are you talking about? He's like is that your nickname? I was like no, that's not my nickname. He's like well, I already changed it in my phone and everything, and so the shift just slowly started calling me sweet tea and it just started spreading and I couldn't stop it. That's fine.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3:Very, very simple, but yeah, there's worse ways.
Speaker 1:You have to name my sweet tea.
Speaker 2:It's probably where my head was. Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3:No, I don't even like sweet tea. I'm like more of a half and half kind of guy Like so, so dumb, yeah sweet tea.
Speaker 2:So dumb. Now I get to yell at that. I don't want to see you across the parking lot.
Speaker 1:Well, have you done anything to embarrass yourself? I'm not just another people. Marry you Mm. Hmm, I mean rookie mistakes you got. Please don't be one of those guys like, oh no, I've such a squared away perfect career.
Speaker 3:Well, I mean, I remember. So this was embarrassed and this was more gross. Like you know, when you're learning, uh, in FTO, you're just, you're on pins and needles because you're so nervous about everything, and so we had an emergency detention. And this is like when I very first started first phase and old department, first phase, and we're, uh, we get to JPS and you know you're supposed to search the backseat and all that. So I'm sitting there and looking. He's like did you look good enough? I was like I don't know. So I lean in and my hand slips. I was like what the heck? I look on my hand and there's just. And I was just like oh, I was like do you got any hand sanitizer?
Speaker 1:Bear hand, bear hand. I was like do you have any hands?
Speaker 3:He's in there, he starts lobby. He's like, no, I don't. He's like, but we need to get her up there because she wasn't the most friendly. And so we get up there. I'm like, just my hands Like where's the restroom? I need to go find a restroom. So I'm walking and it's starting to dry up. It's just, it was nasty, it was gross. That was one of my. Always wear gloves anytime I'm doing something, especially when it has to do with the power you, I wouldn't take gloves off to bed.
Speaker 3:Yeah, it's card me, I mean she's. That was seven years ago and I'm still. That was bad, that's rough.
Speaker 2:I'm not shaking your hand.
Speaker 1:Yeah that's a. There's my left hand. We're good.
Speaker 3:Your wife, sorry, she does now yeah oh man, that's funny, that's exceptional you.
Speaker 2:But you know what, when it comes to police, there are so many stories when it comes to us touching or having something on our hands bro.
Speaker 2:So I remember and I won't say his name, but me and this guy we're out, and it was like a traffic stop but you go in the jail. So he's backing me up. And I was like, hey, talk to that, pop, that passenger, just watch him. Because he had an open beer Kind of sitting in between his legs in his lap. And so I was like, yeah, he's got a bunch of warrants, so we're gonna take both of them, tow the car. So the officer's over there, he was like, hey, man, I'm gonna grab that beer. And so he grabbed and he goes, I'm just patting you down, make sure you don't have nothing, cuz the guy's kind of halfway answering question. Well, he's doing it without any gloves on, and so he was like terrible he was like oh man, your pants are wet, man, you spilled some of your beer.
Speaker 2:and the guy was like no bro, I peed on myself. Oh man yeah and all that traffic stuff, I fell out. Yeah, bro, you are the nastiest officer, but it is having to a whole bunch of us.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah, I, I glove up for everything. Now it don't matter yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so he's driving around with. Yeah, bro, that's terrible Sweet tea, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:I don't know how we yeah, yeah, you always Think about, like the hard parts of police work and, yes, the traumatic stuff you don't think about the little stuff like that.
Speaker 3:No, it's not little. Well, yeah, you don't think about that stuff.
Speaker 1:Yeah, what are you doing your personal time? That that's a little, yeah good point yeah.
Speaker 2:So did she apologize, did she say oh sorry.
Speaker 3:No, she actually like, oh, like, not a big deal yeah.
Speaker 2:I was like you could have said something.
Speaker 3:Yeah, like we. Yeah, you said something.
Speaker 1:I mean, it's probably the least of her worries at the time. But it's you make me clean the car.
Speaker 3:No, no, we would use some like it's good company or something.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I Some some tears, I woulda know, I wish you would tell me clean it.
Speaker 3:After my hands slipped and I was good.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you paid, it is yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I remember resting a guy and you go to pat him down and I'm like, bro, what's that in your pocket? I couldn't really tell. It was a little vibrating circle ring thing and I was like man.
Speaker 3:I don't know what you've been doing. I don't want to know. He was like no you can pull it out.
Speaker 2:I'm like not, not yet. Let me let me put these gloves on and you pull it out. I'm like what is that?
Speaker 1:people walking by like I agree, never seen it before. What?
Speaker 2:the hell is that? Yeah, you see some of the craziest things. This line of work, oh yeah.
Speaker 1:Mmm.
Speaker 2:All right, so I want to go back to you. Worked in our jail, is it? Is it anything like we see on TV? And let me preface it with this you see like a guy in the cell and I guess you're telling them come out, for whatever reason come out, come out. He's like no, no, no, you want to come in here and get me. He's ready to fight as she's ready to fight. Have you ever been involved in one of those situations where, like you're, you have to go in and get that person?
Speaker 3:Mm-hmm, yeah, usually it's like the people in isolation, like, for whatever reason, they're tearing something up or they're flooding their toilet or they start Like covering their cameras where you can't see it. Like all, right now we got to go take them to the padded sale. Oh so, yeah, that that's happened a couple times, but it if it when it's your first time. You're like crap, getting amped up, like, oh, what's about to happen. Then you got to remember you got like six other people with you, like right, it's gonna be, he'll be fine, it's just, it's an interesting feeling.
Speaker 2:How do you Everything in there is is either concrete or metal right? How do you flood your?
Speaker 3:toilet on purpose, just start shoving toilet paper down there. Oh, so, shirts, you can. So so they have like holding cells and typically they'll they'll flood those first. So like they'll be in one of the bigger holding cells and they just start shoving toilet paper after toilet paper and then just flush, flush, flush, flush, and then I'll just start flooding everywhere. And so then you got to go in there. You're slipping around and you got to go take them to isolation and then they start tearing stuff up in there. So then you got to go take them to padded sale.
Speaker 2:So what can you tear up in isolation? Because in my mind nothing moves in there right, it's like a concrete bench and well.
Speaker 3:It's typically not tearing that up, just like clogging the toilet or splashing water out and stuff like that. Or they still have the camera. So if we forget to take the toilet paper out, they can, they'll get it wet and they'll just throw it up there, and now the camera you can't see him becomes a safety thing.
Speaker 1:So it's imagine the mindset of like I'm in jail and I would be like crap. I messed up the sucks and this guy's like yeah. This is a camera.
Speaker 3:Yeah, or yeah, throw poop at it, or yeah, okay time time out.
Speaker 2:Wait a minute. Sweet tea. We changed your name. You're nasty.
Speaker 1:Sweet nasty.
Speaker 2:Um all right, so have you had that.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah. So there was. There's one day. It was busy, busy, we, we just we were finishing up and this guy was just being sarcastic, being a smart mouth. I was like, hey, screw this, come on, you're going to isolation. So I put him in isolation and then I get back that day and as soon as I open up to jail I was like, oh my god, what is that smell? And as I'm walking up, you know they give us like all right, this is what's going on. Like what is that smell? Like I'm trying to figure it out. They're like, oh, the guy you put in isolation, he went off the hinges like he was tearing stuff up. When I mean stuff up, I mean himself by smear and and I I don't know, just some nasty stuff. They ended up having to have a company come out like to clean it. That's how gross it was. Usually like the detention officers will clean, but it was disgusting. Like the whole jail smell like. I'm mad with you. I was, yeah, I was mad because I had to smell all day.
Speaker 1:Oh, she was, it was a jail staff man of you.
Speaker 3:Oh no, I mean, it wasn't my fault, he was, you know, I just I put him there because he was being smart, you know?
Speaker 2:Okay, so you said Got question at the question now.
Speaker 3:Yeah you said, the detention staff usually cleans up if it's something minor, I guess yeah, so like I was working overtime, this was just like a month or so ago I went in there and it was in the the medical cells, and we have the Tarrant County came to pick up. So that's. The lady stepped out and then, during our cleanup this is after she had left we're going in there and cleaning up and I look I mean it's like stacked this high of nasty. Yeah, I can't get away from it. It's just Guess who had to clean it up. Yeah, yeah, I thought I was like we get a company out like no, just get a trash bag, get some gloves, you scoop it up and then, yeah, okay, yeah, yeah, I don't.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I'm not doing it. I was waiting for the bike over time.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I mean like I've worked a lot of OT and Joan, that was like one of the like gosh, dang it. That's the only one I find myself in that situation.
Speaker 2:Just what? I'm a police officer. They didn't give you a shovel or nothing.
Speaker 3:Trash bags and, like they said they would help me up, I was like there's, I mean there's, it's a small room. Anyways, what is another set of hands gonna do? Like it, just it, but they ain't your hands.
Speaker 2:So that's a good point.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah. No, I loved up that double-gloved yeah.
Speaker 2:Can you get that? No, sir. Yeah, look, your overtime course is says here that you left at 613. Yeah, see that when I said nope.
Speaker 1:Give me my 1313 minutes to pay. Oh man, now you. You said that you have your 10 year old boy and a year old boy, right? Yep, I also have a 10 year old boy, a Seven about to be a year old boy.
Speaker 1:You, yeah, do you? I don't know about you. Like I find Raising, like I tend to sometimes view every little bit of anything they do wrong is like Maybe a little outsized could just do to what I've seen. It's like I'd, you know, pick it on her brother or whatever. And it's like, no, you're not gonna grow up and be you know like these you struggle with that too.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah it's. It's like you got to find that fine line of like parenting and then just like overstep and just from the things that we've seen and it's it's a daily Struggle, like just because again big brother picks on little brother and it's like, dude, you can't be doing that. Or little brother acts out in school like, hey, what are you doing? You got to pay attention to school. You, you know, I've seen people drop out of school and there you it's just, it's a, it's a struggle.
Speaker 2:Yeah, Just one of the topic is harder than you think, because I'm one of those. My daughter is 11. Oh Daddy, can my friends come over to spend a night? No man, you know I don't want, nobody, you know Don't. Can I go spending that with something?
Speaker 3:Oh yeah absolutely no, yeah that ain't an option.
Speaker 2:Yeah so it is, it's hard, and so now we find I said, okay, well, now you can have play dates. You know, tell these girls they parents or whoever come over, drop them off. I'm cook hamburger hot dog the job going back home. Yeah so we're trying to venture outside that little that that police boxes. I call it safety bubble, oh man.
Speaker 1:It is real.
Speaker 2:The struggle is real.
Speaker 1:Yeah, there's only a couple of Couple people that the kiddos stay with and it's a. It's a weird situation to be in, because you're talking at least like us, we're talking to civilians and it was like what you think I'm gonna touch your kids.
Speaker 3:It's like Kinda maybe I don't know you that well yeah it's like I, I mean, I hate this.
Speaker 1:It's just it, this job does a weird stuff to you. But it's like I don't. I mean you rare, it's rarely the. The ones where it's like, oh, I've never seen that guy before. Rarely it's almost always.
Speaker 2:Yeah, oh, we know so, and so yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and it's the simplest thing, so like you could be leaving targeting the kid wants to run out, try to get to the car. First they're racing each other like whoa, whoa, whoa, what are you doing? Like I've seen kids get hit by cars and then you overreact like hey, stop running, what are you doing? And then they're like I was just racing, but right, yeah, it's. Yeah, very a fine line.
Speaker 1:I was. I was had to apologize to my 10 year old yesterday. I thought I lost patience about something. I was probably wasn't that big of a deal, but in the moment he's like you know that I have an idea. I was like what was that it? Maybe, if you think you're getting frustrated next time, you can just say I'll talk to you about it later. I was like it's not a terrible idea.
Speaker 3:My first.
Speaker 1:My first reaction was like Okay, yeah, yeah, I should not, not terrible.
Speaker 2:I don't know what.
Speaker 3:I'll do that, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:What about them then venturing out and they started to kind of latch on to your profession as something they'd be interested in Marine Corps or?
Speaker 3:my youngest. Yeah, my youngest wants to. My oldest doesn't seem like he has a temperament for it, but my youngest does. He's a. For whatever reason, he's super into fitness. He's eight years old and, like for Christmas, he got these little eight pound weights and he's like sitting in his room doing this.
Speaker 1:I'm like what are you doing? You?
Speaker 3:know he said it multiple times. You know he wants to be police officer. I'm like, well, you know that's what you want to do. I'm not like gonna stray away from it, I'll help you out. But try to do something different. Be like a. If you're already already athletic, do be a sports. You know athlete, you're something right. So but yeah, the youngest, he's already kind of leaning towards that.
Speaker 1:See my youngest swear to God if I, he said. He said I was trying to save some money and I had mentioned, like maybe you take a break from baseball, and he's like, no, I'm gonna be a baseball player to the day, right before I die. Okay, buddy, yeah I.
Speaker 3:Hope you are.
Speaker 1:But my oldest one yeah, I don't know, we'll see he's kind of expressed an interest A bedtime, he mentions it. I'm just like, yeah, dude, being a firefighter would be.
Speaker 3:Awesome, get to sleep. He's like no, I'm not being a cop.
Speaker 1:I'm like, yeah, firefighter, that's where it's at.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, we'll see, that's funny.
Speaker 3:So you mentioned.
Speaker 2:Like you have a uncle, that's police house.
Speaker 3:Yeah, so he used to work at grapevine. He I don't know how long he worked in grapevine, but he stopped and he went to go teach at a high school. He did that for like a semester or half a year and he's like the same for me.
Speaker 1:So now yeah, no kidding.
Speaker 3:Yeah, he's out in the Grandberry so he worked. He's a lieutenant out there.
Speaker 2:Oh, cool, mm-hmm. So you don't have the, any resistance, you don't have the family members going hey, are you sure you want to do this? Are you gonna do something else and get out of it? It's rough.
Speaker 3:No, no, they I mean everybody's been really supportive. Now my youngest sister, she's talked about it and there's some resistance there. They're like whoa, whoa, whoa. Why don't you look at doing something different? She has mentioned it.
Speaker 2:I don't that she wants to be a police officer. Yeah, okay.
Speaker 3:I don't know if it was a phase or what. She hasn't really brought it up to me since. So she did a writeout with me About a year ago. She enjoyed it, she had a fun time, yeah, but um, she hasn't said anything, so I don't know. Maybe she'd change it hard, or 21 okay, yeah, yeah, we cool.
Speaker 1:Yeah, a lot of a lot of guys. My family are Both my, both my brothers are my 20 and a holiday is not 25 year old brother. He did write out of me here when he was Entertainment. He had been a being a police officer, but then he went to the department that I came from that a bunch of my family is it's from as well, so I got you. We'll see. We'll see if he winds up, come over.
Speaker 3:Yeah, you bet some ship. Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:I mean, I'm sure he knows that he'd have a job, but not gonna. Not gonna be that guy yeah yeah, all right, tennis.
Speaker 2:So we usually wrap it up with when we we talked to the officers, what is something that you could tell somebody that either is coming out of the detention staff that's like yeah, I want to transition over and be a police officer or a lateral because you're that. You know, what advice do you give any of these these people?
Speaker 3:Make sure you're doing it for the right reasons. I know some people are like all, like drawn in by, like you can make this much as a police officer, and then they go through all the training like okay, and then they get out on the street and like whoa, this is actually legit. So just make sure you're doing it for the right reasons. This is the biggest thing. That'd be my biggest advice. Now, if you're just starting out, you you're 21, 22 Jails a really good place to or detention centers really good place to start off. Because I had worked in a production plant for a little while, lost all my like communicating skills, had a hard time talking to people and Working in the jail. You, you learn to talk people down, but you also learn when talking is not gonna change anything and you're gonna have to actually go hands-on. It's a really good Step in stone for being a police officer.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think it's. I wish it was utilized more and not just from a perspective of like that, that's awesome. But, also like the fact that you don't need a degree. My thick, so there's a lot like me getting a college degree. I mean that, unless I were to promote, didn't make a whole bunch of sense for me, right? I knew from the young age I was gonna be a police officer, so haven't. And you and I did took a similar military track that didn't work out the exact way we thought yeah yeah, and you know.
Speaker 1:So having that detention option would have been, would have been awesome. Save me some money.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah, you know it's a really good. I mean I don't think God be where I'm at if it wasn't for it, because I did Apply to a couple places before becoming a detention officer and they're just like this guy's, young and I was 21. I think I have a baby face now. I look like I was that did look 12 and Just no life experience as far as what would be beneficial for police work. So, yeah, it was really good, really good learning experience.
Speaker 2:Yeah, again, I second that get into the detention center and work, because you get to see the officers, you get to see, you know the people that are being arrested, how they're acting. Like you said, just being able to communicate in Tahton, that's huge, yes, you start that proving yourself process, like when.
Speaker 1:I was in academy they said everything you do is a constant application for any other position you might want in the department. Not say you should want to go somewhere besides patrol, but if you do, mm-hmm, every report you write, every phone call you have with the detective, everything you're doing a supervisor, ask you, all that is an application to your next, you know, potential position.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so the tension will be the same way. You come in and you're the people who will be making decisions about your hiring, are the ones you'll be working for and with Detention so yeah, yeah, yeah, well, we appreciate it, man. Yeah absolutely Hopefully, hopefully it was a good time yeah that's fun, so we'll see you later.
Speaker 2:Sweet tea. All right, guys. Next time.