#57 - Shot Six Times: A Law Enforcement Officer's Survival Story w/TJ Webb

What happens when a routine warrant service turns into a life-altering gunfight? TJ shares his harrowing journey of survival after being shot six times at point-blank range while serving on a U.S. Marshals Task Force.

From the moment bullets tore through his body—striking his face, shoulder, hands, arm, and shattering his femur—TJ takes us through every vivid detail of his fight to stay alive. The split-second decision-making, the voice in his head screaming "you failed," and the determination to crawl under a vehicle as gunfire continued around him showcase the raw reality of officer-involved shootings.

But this story extends far beyond the shooting itself. TJ's recovery journey reveals shocking gaps in how departments support wounded officers. Despite catastrophic injuries, he received virtually no mental health resources—a disturbing reality many first responders face. While doctors told him running again would take two years, TJ set an ambitious goal to complete a half marathon within 12 months. Against all medical expectations, he succeeded.

Perhaps most powerful is TJ's approach to trauma recovery. Rather than avoiding the shooting location, he deliberately visited it repeatedly until it held no power over him. "I didn't want that parking lot of blacktop and concrete to own me," he explains. "I wanted to own that parking lot."

Through candid discussions about police culture, administrative failures, and life after the badge, TJ offers rare insights into law enforcement realities while demonstrating extraordinary resilience. His journey reminds us that while trauma can permanently change us, our response to it ultimately defines us.

Have you considered how you would rebuild your life if everything you identified with was suddenly stripped away? Listen now for a masterclass in finding purpose beyond adversity.

Follow TJ on Instagram: @thetjwebb

To support TJ, here's his book, check it out!!: CLICK HERE!!!

Chapters

• 0:00 Introduction and Law Enforcement Background
• 18:10 Academy Training and Early Police Career
• 33:51 Code Switching and Administrative Issues
• 51:25 K-9 Work and Task Force Experience
• 1:06:35 The Night of the Shooting
• 1:27:20 Hospital Recovery and Family Impact
• 1:49:45 Rehabilitation and Learning to Walk Again
• 2:07:30 Finding Purpose After Law Enforcement
• 2:20:35 Mental Health in Law Enforcement
• 2:39:40 Life Today and Lessons Learned

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:09

dude, yeah, tj, you ready it's rock and roll man man, I'm excited for this one.

Speaker 1: 0:14

I uh found you a while back. We've been going back and forth and planned a trip out here. You have quite the story. You, um, were a law enforcement officer and you got shot six times while serving a warrant. Yeah, so I definitely, obviously we're going to jump into that side of things. But first let's just do. We're we're we're pretty relaxed here, we just shoot the shit and, uh, we're just going to talk a little bit about your life and we'll jump into it. But first, something I do on the podcast, um, that I'm always going to do, no matter what how big or small we are, is, um, I want to offer law enforcement and veterans opportunities to have businesses to send us stuff to give to guests, and so, um, this actually, I might have a shirt for you. It's the god-fearing lifting club.

Speaker 1: 0:58

He's a law enforcement officer out of california nice trying to get guys back into the gym through christ and you know, being able to share the word of god and lifting and all that good stuff. So he's, he's an awesome dude, active duty still. Then we got the war machine. He was a marine combat marine, got out, became a cop and got. He got also shot in the line of duty. So you guys have some something in common. And then, uh, sea state coffee. He's a recon marine. He's here, local, so he got out, started sea state coffees. I'll send you home with some, some cold brews and some coffee grounds if you guys are into the coffee thing. So it was actually the first coffee I've ever drank.

Speaker 1: 1:31

He called me out on my episode, so yeah and, uh, forced me to do it and you hook now. No, it's great coffee I just done. I'm just not a coffee guy I don't have. That was what weird dude overseas like no coffee, coffee, caffeine, no coffee, didn't smoke, didn't dip, especially for like military and stuff like that it was like three of us in the whole platoon.

Speaker 1: 1:48

Wow, man, and yeah, and I was sunflower seeds. I just chewed holes in my, in my, my whole top of my vehicle was covered in sunflower seeds. I'd have to like swipe, you know, brush it off every day.

Speaker 2: 1:57

Cause I get that with baseball season.

Speaker 1: 1:58

Yeah no no I feel it though. Well, dude, I guess let's just jump. Oh, and look before you, you got a book, so I want to definitely touch into that and talk about your story, which I'm sure we'll cover some of that along this way as well. So, dude, where are you from, and let's just jump right into it.

Speaker 2: 2:15

Yeah, man, like most people, small town America, dude, milford, delaware, milford, delaware, populations probably around 12, 15,. Delaware, melford, delaware, population's probably around 12,000, 15,000. Grew up there. To give you a point of reference, dover Air Force Base it's about 25 minutes south of the Dover Air Force Base, hour and a half south of Philly. Yeah, grew up there, had a younger brother, five years younger than me.

Speaker 2: 2:42

Mom was stay-at-home, stay-at-home mom and my dad started out as an over-the-road trucker. Oh, okay. So I was like probably around six or seven maybe when my brother came around and then got into construction work blacktop and driveways, pavement and working on cars, all that kind of stuff. And then about the time I got to high school, he took a job with the city in the street department. So he was in charge of like a trash collection, street construction, all that kind of stuff. Okay, yeah, I mean that's pretty much my childhood. Man Grew up playing sports. That was pretty much all I cared about. What sports? Baseball, football. And then in high school my junior and senior I got into track and field.

Speaker 1: 3:28

Okay, yeah you look like a runner yeah, yeah, I'm not built for that. Yeah, my knees don't like it anymore, but I like no, it's like when you hit 40, everything they talk about it. You're like it just starts falling off, starts cracking and popping. Yeah, terrible dude. So college? Yeah, did you go off to college?

Speaker 2: 3:45

I did community college for a semester and a half, hated it. Okay, as expected, and yeah, I just gave up on that, went back to some odd-none jobs here and there until I was fortunate enough to get hired at the Gill Police Academy Okay.

Speaker 1: 3:59

Yeah, let's jump into it. What made you want to be a cop?

Speaker 2: 4:03

Starting out, man, like in high school, I didn't really know what I wanted to do. Yeah, like I just liked sports. You know what I mean? I hated school, but I was around law enforcement quite a bit because my parents had friends in law enforcement, so I was always around cops from time to time. My dad used to watch cops on TV all the time.

Speaker 2: 4:24

That was like the big show back then, so watching that kind of shit all the time. So around the time I started after I graduated high school, like we have a lot of beach towns where I live, okay, so big vacation spot man. So like they have programs there with the department. It's called like seasonal policing. So you got to be 18 and you work as a seasonal cop. So you do like minor misdemeanor arrest, you do some traffic stuff you're just dealing with drunks and stuff on the beach.

Speaker 2: 4:51

Yeah, you do with drunks man, like the town I worked in was called dewey beach, yeah, um, so it's like a summer party town for college kids, so you're dealing with drunks, you know digital release fights, stupid shit like that. Um, so it's kind of like a taste of it. You get a taste of it. You don't carry a firearm. Okay, back then you got a baton and some caps done and you went to town. That was it.

Speaker 1: 5:12

I mean, are you getting paid or is this volunteer work?

Speaker 2: 5:14

No, you get minimum wage Okay.

Speaker 1: 5:17

I mean that's a pretty awesome program, though they get a bunch of extra help for really cheap. It was cool dude.

Speaker 2: 5:22

I drove the paddy wagon, so I drove around from street to street just picking up drunks all night. Oh God, it was great, dude, it was a great gig man. Like 18, 19 years old. It was awesome man.

Speaker 1: 5:31

And you're making money and you're learning.

Speaker 2: 5:32

Yeah, you're making money. You're living at the beach. You can't beat it, man, it's a win-win. How long did you do? Did that for three summers, and then the summer I turned 21, I went into police academy.

Speaker 1: 5:47

Really, yeah, so very young, yeah. So do you know a lot of the guys by this point, since you have three years of helping? Or is it a completely different department that you joined?

Speaker 2: 5:56

No, so, I got hired by that department, by Dewey Beach, okay, and then they sent me to the academy which in Delaware we have a few academies now, but back then pretty much everybody went to the Delaware State Police Academy. So that's where I went. So you're mixed with, like guys from other towns uh state troopers.

Speaker 2: 6:11

You're all in there together bunking with another um. So I knew a couple guys that were in there but that were also like summer cops, like seasonals and like the other surrounding agencies. Yeah, um, but I didn't really know anybody else, really didn't know too many people in there, and I was just 21, man Didn't know what the hell I was doing. Got lucky Probably too young for police academy, you know.

Speaker 1: 6:27

Okay, so the Northeast is pretty political. Yeah, when it comes to firefighting and cops. Was it like that in your area?

Speaker 2: 6:33

The only reason I ask is like where I'm from, like you have to be born into itboy, you know um kind of thing, but um, as far as like delaware state police was, they always like seem to hire outside the state for some reason, I don't know why, but, um, yeah, a lot of like the smaller agencies. It was always like who you know? Yeah, this and that and the other, yeah it was kind of competitive.

Speaker 2: 7:00

It's really. Back then it was really hard to get hired as a cop. Not so much nowadays, because nobody wants to do it.

Speaker 1: 7:05

For sure.

Speaker 2: 7:06

But back then it was really tough, so I was really fortunate to be on. But that's where putting in my time there as a seasonal officer paid off. That's what got me in the door, yeah.

Speaker 1: 7:15

So it was a smart play yeah for sure. Did you know when you were doing the seasonal stuff that like hey, I want to be a cop? And were you waiting for a spot to open up? Or was it just something to kill the summer and make some money?

Speaker 2: 7:25

When I first started my first summer, I was like I'll try it out. I don't know what the hell else I'm doing, right? Yeah, it's the only thing I really had interest in.

Speaker 1: 7:38

And then I was like yeah, this is it, this is the ticket, I want to do this shit. So you, it was great. Yeah, I feel like that, and then you're living there.

Speaker 2: 7:44

So when your night's off, you're going out to the bars hanging out. You're 19, 20 years old, getting in with fake IDs and shit. I mean, that's what you did.

Speaker 1: 7:51

And then the next day you're arresting somebody for doing the same shit, yeah yeah, 19 years old, oh 100% 100%. I'm not going to sugarcoat it. It is what it is. Hey, it's facts are facts. I'd have been doing the same shit. Yeah, exactly. And then you know how to get away and deal with it. Exactly, yeah, yeah, you just learn the inside of the system.

Speaker 2: 8:11

Most of the bars knew who you were, so they just let you in anyway.

Speaker 1: 8:13

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 8:13

So that's the way it was.

Speaker 1: 8:19

We're talking about back in the small towns. Yeah, dude, I'm from a really small town. It hasn't changed much, but it's that you know the good old boy feel and you get away with so much.

Speaker 2: 8:29

You get away with everything, yeah.

Speaker 1: 8:30

One or two cops in town, that's it, and you know where they're at at all times. That was such a fun way of growing up.

Speaker 2: 8:36

Now it's like bro you can't even mistakes gonna haunt you forever, whereas, like all my mistakes, I don't.

Speaker 1: 8:48

Nobody even remembers them or knows the stories they're just stories yeah yes, yep, yeah, myths and legends, and now it's like everything you can't get away. I feel I tell my kids all the time like god man, like we were the last good generation when it came to just mischief and fun, like Like you can do so much now.

Speaker 2: 9:06

It's wild man.

Speaker 1: 9:07

Can't even walk through the mountains anymore. You're looking for trail cams. There's so much, it's true, dude?

Speaker 2: 9:11

Yeah, you're looking for cameras everywhere you go. Yeah, it's wild.

Speaker 1: 9:14

Yeah, it is so the academy you had a little bit of experience beforehand. Was that like a culture shock going into it was it was a very militaristic type of academy where they're like it's very militaristic.

Speaker 2: 9:26

Um, you know you pt it. You know zero six. You're up all night. They're fucking with you at night are they how so? Uh, you know they put you to bed late, especially like the first. You know a few weeks like they're putting you to bed late. They're waking up in the middle of night taking your runs, emptying your racks, throwing your shit around, that kind of shit so you're like full on boot camp style yeah, it's very DSP's.

Speaker 2: 9:46

Academy is very like boot camp style. I don't know how how much it is now, because everything's changed so much. I think it's still pretty similar. But you know generations, every generation is the worst, right you know what I mean, yeah, yeah but yeah, it's very military, like for me it was.

Speaker 2: 10:02

Uh, it was eye-opening for me because I didn't have a lot of life experience, dude like I lived at home, graduated high school, went to community college, did this, that and the other, and then boom 21, here you are in the academy and I'm like, ah, fuck man. Yeah, it was.

Speaker 1: 10:15

It was a culture shock, for sure I could imagine, are you guys in squad bays or how was?

Speaker 2: 10:19

it. How was one big? Open squad bay okay, racks, boom, yep yeah, how was that that's?

Speaker 1: 10:25

and the reason I ask is because, like in our mos, it's not, doesn't exist anymore, but we were one of the last, yeah, mos's in the marine corps to still have students and squad base like it's. I mean, you're talking 75 people, dudes, in one room, all racked up in bunks.

Speaker 2: 10:38

Yeah, I think we had like 52 in my class and it was just a giant room of bunk beds.

Speaker 1: 10:43

Dude, make metal racks just like yeah, like paris island or something exactly um, yeah, it was a culture shock, man.

Speaker 2: 10:49

And then you go in the bathroom. It's just like seven shower heads and one's broken. You know what I mean? Fucked up. You know what I mean?

Speaker 1: 10:56

uh, big culture shock oh yeah, were you three thinking life at this point, or were you all about it?

Speaker 2: 11:02

nah, I mean I was in for a long haul. Yeah um yeah, my first thought was, like I just got to get through this shit and it really wasn't that bad. Like once you figure out, like it's just a game it is. You know what I mean. Once you figure it out, you're good. You know, by like as long as everyone's got their shit together, by like going through like week six as long as you get it together, and then you just kind of laugh at all the stupid shit.

Speaker 1: 11:22

Yeah, I mean you just roll with it.

Speaker 2: 11:23

It was fun.

Speaker 1: 11:24

How was the tase and pepper spray portion of it? I always like to ask because I'm so different with it.

Speaker 2: 11:28

Well, back then we didn't even have tasers yet. Oh shit, yeah, it was just pepper spray. I had already been sprayed as a summer cop, so I knew what to expect. Oh, so they made you do that.

Speaker 1: 11:44

sprayed as that, you got sprayed, and all that shit in summer okay, okay, yeah, um, so I knew what to expect, but it still sucks. Yeah, that shit's brutal.

Speaker 2: 11:47

And then he had me. They're like it's like they put a whole fucking bottle on you or something. Just empty it on you. You know, give me the fire hose and shit. But uh, yeah, it was. Uh, it was funny to watch other people that hadn't had it oh, I was used to it, yeah, yeah um, but yeah, it wasn't that bad yeah.

Speaker 1: 12:02

Some guys trip, they lose it. You know what I mean. They just come unglued and other guys it's. It sucks, no matter what, but it's, it's fun to sit back. I used to teach a lot of courses where we would do a lot of like um knife fighting and weapons fighting, and then we'd have to spray these guys down and you get it on you. You know when you're fighting these guys as as an instructor, but good lord, I mean every, every single person is completely different. I mean you see some big yoke dude walk up and they get hosed down and they just lose it. They melt, lose it, like freaking out. You're like, oh my god, everyone's like this dude's gonna put up a fight and they're always, they're always the ones that just lose it yeah, they could just come completely unglued.

Speaker 2: 12:39

You seem to watch man. They just line you up there and they just go down the line.

Speaker 1: 12:43

Yeah, we got screwed. One time we were doing a gas chamber before our deployment and we're all young, dumb marines and afterward they um, because ours are, they have these capsules and they have a little burner and they throw this capsule like little crystal capsules on there and it just turns into a you know a cloud, and so they're like everybody's done for the day. We've already gone through and it's not bad. You know, you take your mask off. You gotta like seeing some marine corps, him or some stupid shit and then put your mask back on dawn, clear it and all that yeah so you know you have a whole battalion of marines going through, so it takes hours.

Speaker 1: 13:17

So by the time you're gone through, you're like, okay, we're good. And then you start watching what the end. They were like, hey, who's the baddest dudes? Who? Who are the toughest marines? And of course, like yeah, all those idiots were like, yeah, my platoon were all like, yeah, we're the baddest dudes here. They're like we're gonna let you guys run through. Who wants to run through? No mask. And we're like, oh, we got it, we've already done the gas chamber today. Like no problem, well, they all what's left over those capsules they just dump on that burner. And they didn't tell us. And so we all stack up no masks, nothing. We're just gonna run in one door and run through, do a lap through and run out the back door. These dudes lock us in there. So we run in and they lock all the doors and you can't even see, like your hand in front of your face and we didn't know.

Speaker 1: 13:59

They set us up, so they had cameras and I knew what they were doing everybody's waiting, and so they finally opened the door up and we just kept piling out. I got to get the video. My buddy has it. Like there's just I'm talking snot just pouring out. Dudes are crawling out on their hands Like it was they got us. That was the last time I ever volunteered to run back through a gas chamber again. There was, lessons were learned. It was quite the experience, but that's like the typical Marine shit to do, you know.

Speaker 2: 14:24

It is.

Speaker 1: 14:27

So you graduate. Well, do you do a field training, officer ride, or how did it work back then?

Speaker 2: 14:34

Yeah, so it was six months at the academy you get out. Your academy was six months long. Yeah, it was like 24 weeks, I guess.

Speaker 2: 14:40

Good Lord, okay Six months, started in September, finished like midway through february, so something um, and then you get out and do 12 weeks of your fto program. Um, I think mine mine was even shorter, I think mine was like eight weeks, because I don't do we was like a nine man department, okay, and I graduated in the winter and there ain't shit there in the winter, like everything's closed. There's like one bar open, like on friday and sat it's like I said there's nothing there in the wintertime.

Speaker 1: 15:05

So you guys are just chilling.

Speaker 2: 15:06

You're chilling, dude. It's like, yeah, you're not doing much in the winter.

Speaker 1: 15:12

Summertime you're bumping.

Speaker 2: 15:14

Oh for sure, wintertime it's like you got a whole winter break. Pretty much yeah.

Speaker 1: 15:17

And there's how many guys were on this department Like nine of us, so it's hard to get into then you got lucky.

Speaker 2: 15:22

Yeah, you got to be there as a seasonal or know somebody. They don't just hire random people that walk in the door that night. That makes sense yeah, and then in the summertime it's a lot smaller now. I think now they have 10 or 15 summer comps. Back then it was like 40. Okay, so it's lots changed since then. But yeah, so graduated, did maybe eight weeks at the most, probably on FTO, and then it was like all right, you're good, cut you loose.

Speaker 1: 15:48

Really.

Speaker 2: 15:48

And you just kind of found your way.

Speaker 1: 15:49

What was your first day out? I mean, you have some experience already, but now you're certified, you're sworn in as a law enforcement officer.

Speaker 2: 15:56

I'll tell you the weirdest thing and it started like the day of graduation was when you load your gun up and you put it on. When you load your gun up and you put it on, you're like walk around with a gun hanging off your hip, like a 45 Cal Glock hanging off your hip, and you're like, uh, this is weird man. You know what I mean, cause I'm not. I've never walked around like open.

Speaker 1: 16:12

Gary, before or anything. You know what I mean.

Speaker 2: 16:13

Yeah, it was just strange feeling. I've heard this before from guys, have you? I wasn't like a big gun enthusiast growing up, like I went shooting once in a while with my dad or something that's about it. So that's like oh, here's graduation day, get your gear on, boom, here's your gun, load it, put in your holster and then you go to work and you're like oh man, this is, this is real Heavy, this is real.

Speaker 2: 16:39

Yeah, shit's getting real now, yeah, people are looking at you different, you know, and you're just like I feel like you're gardening it all the time. You know what I mean. So that was a little tricky to get used to. But you know, it's like anything, I should get used to it. And then I don't even remember my first day at work. It was kind of like load up in the car and we'll go pull some cars over, I guess, kind of deal. It wasn't anything like crazy, yeah. And then at nighttime it was like all right, we got to try to find you some DUIs or something. So got a couple DUIs. You know, on training, which I hated DUIs, they were terrible. Why Just so much to it, dude? It's almost like if you lock someone for a DUI, it's like you're on trial. You know what I mean Like when you go to court with them it's like where did this cop fuck up?

Speaker 1: 17:21

somewhere he had to fuck something up, oh 100.

Speaker 2: 17:23

It's always like that at court, but duis are just the worst. I hate like all the nits of testing, like the eyes and the walk and turn, all that kind of shit. I just hated it and if you don't do that by the book it's gone, case dismissed done. Yeah, you might just not even worry about it, done deal and it could be the slightest little thing little thing, man.

Speaker 1: 17:38

Lawyers eat it up have you ever have a case like that, where you're like fuck, fuck that somebody?

Speaker 2: 17:43

I had some. I never. Luckily I never had to go testify. I think I testified in one DUI trial. That was it. I think the rest of it was like pled out or thrown out.

Speaker 1: 17:51

Okay.

Speaker 2: 17:52

Yeah, that was it. Man Like I. I avoided them at all costs, I just hated it. It was not my thing.

Speaker 1: 18:05

That is the craziest part about, like our judicial, judicial system or the courts, whatever it is. But I mean you have somebody dead to rights and on camera, everything but one, you don't read the miranda rights correctly or miss something, I mean, and then they're free to go like that that was the other thing back then, like we didn't even have cameras. Yeah, we didn't have cameras in the car.

Speaker 2: 18:17

You're old school police, old school dude old school, no cameras in the car, the old like light barn on top. I think they were called street hawks. They were like when you turned them on they're like big blocky ones and when you turn them on it was like loud, like like you could hear it. It was terrible, dude. It's terrible, you know, because it's like this is like what year was this? This is uh, oh, three, but my car and stuff and my lights were like from the 90s, you know. I mean so it was like I remember that big ass thing just making that noise, like when you're on the radio trying to talk you can't even hear anything Because it's just like like gearing.

Speaker 2: 18:46

Okay, terrible dude, awful Old school man.

Speaker 1: 18:50

I love old school man. Yeah, I mean, that was like real police work.

Speaker 2: 18:54

Yeah, old school crown, vics and stuff. Now they're driving around in Priuses and shit. You know what I mean of this.

Speaker 1: 19:06

I don't know it had to been out of florida. Yeah, this cop car comes like drifting. Our corvette comes drifting and then this like yeah, I don't what the hell was. Like a dodge raptor, like all souped up. I'm like these motherfuckers are driving around in corvettes and souped up trucks now like good for the department but yeah, now they got like electric cars and shit out there.

Speaker 2: 19:24

They got teslas like just give me like a 98 crown vic and I'm good to go you just beat the crap out of it and I'll have to worry about. I hated when they got rid of those things.

Speaker 1: 19:32

I hated it so you transitioned from old school. I want, when I say old school police work.

Speaker 2: 19:38

I mean it like I mean it was, it was like the end of, like that era of old school you were.

Speaker 1: 19:41

You were able to get away with a lot more than you didn't have to worry about. So much.

Speaker 2: 19:45

Yeah, like how you talk to people exactly. You know what I mean, because I mean to be honest. In police work, dude, people get ate up on this. Like how you talk to someone, well, depending on who you're dealing with, is how you're going to talk to them. You know what I mean. I'm not going to talk to some street idiot who's got guns in the car. Hello, sir, like that shit doesn't work. You gotta get on their level. So there's a term for it which I just learned like code switching code switching.

Speaker 2: 20:12

Okay, I haven't heard that one I had a tyler.

Speaker 1: 20:14

He was a cop that we had on and he talked about it and it was a big deal in the community because a lot of cops disagreed with code. They say you should talk to everybody the same. Yeah, some people say that. And then there was a huge other side of this was like dude, you can't walk up to an 80-year-old woman the same way you walk up to a gangbanger. No, you can't, dude, so you agree with this A hundred percent.

Speaker 2: 20:35

Yeah, a hundred percent. 19 years of experience, a hundred percent. Agree with that. And I learned that real quick, quick, really. Yeah, dude, different, you can't, people don't, because some people take offense to it. Man, some people take offense to that. If you go up to someone, as crazy as it may sound, you go up to someone from a different kind of life, yeah, and you, because they take it as you're talking down to them. Okay, if you try to talk, let's talk like you're all high and mighty with these big fancy words, right, they take offense to it some people do you know.

Speaker 2: 21:02

So you have to get down to their level and let them see that, not that you're one of them, but you're human, you're not a robot. You speak like they do. You understand things that they understand. You have to get on their level. You know what I mean and I think that's important. With any age person you're talking to or where they come from, you have to be able to relate to them. You know what I mean. You got to mirror and match.

Speaker 1: 21:21

I mean it makes you just a better person to be able to relate and get on someone's level.

Speaker 2: 21:25

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 21:26

And when it comes to de-escalating situations, I feel it's a huge. Yeah, that's interesting because I never even knew there was like a term for it until I haven't heard code switching. But I like that. I believe it's called code switching. I'll have to look and see. But yeah, of guys like there was, I found it interesting because to me it makes sense, especially if you're working city, outside of a city where you're, yeah, kind of crossing into rural versus now guys are screwed with that, with all these cameras and I'm not knocking cameras because there's benefits to them, okay, um, I'm not.

Speaker 2: 21:56

I'm not pro, I'm not anti-body cam, um, but it does change the way it does change policing for better and worse. Just pros and cons to everything, right? How so well. I change the way it does change policing for better and worse. You're supposed to con to everything, right? How so Well. I mean the way you talk to people. Now it's like you go and talk to someone on their level. They might not take offense to it, but your administration is going to do, because you just said the word shit to somebody. You know what I mean. Like, give me a break man.

Speaker 2: 22:16

And now you're under investigation and getting wrote up and suspended for four hours because you use the or something stupid. I'm just using that as an example.

Speaker 2: 22:22

And then you know I mean just things like that just how you handle yourself and present yourself to people. And I'm not saying like you're going to do something bad, but if you do something that they don't like and the one complains, and someone complains, now you're hammered because you were trying to get on someone's level so that they can understand. If someone's acting and being crazy and acting a fool, am I going to sit there and serve them? No, I'm going to tell them to sit the hell down and shut the fuck up, because that's what they need to hear. That's what they understand. You know what I mean. It's like if you have a kid and your kid's acting up and going crazy, are you going to be like, come on, buddy.

Speaker 1: 23:09

No, you're going old to do right. Yeah, what's the difference? That's the way I look at it. I feel the biggest problem with law enforcement today is the administrative side of the departments fucking awful dude the more I do this podcast, the more law enforcement officers we talk to it. I feel the common denominator of what ruins careers what gets guys in trouble.

Speaker 1: 23:27

Why guys are hesitating, not reacting the way they should, is because of the administration that is running those departments that are that have completely sold out, yep, and now they're a yes sir and they're doing whatever they can for kickbacks. I mean, it's so many layers in that I've kind of like started listening to the cops talking and it all comes back down to toxic leadership, admin, and I don't want to say leadership because it's, they're not leaders, it's you know being leaders, they're not being leaders.

Speaker 1: 23:59

Like you take these chiefs I mean I I have so many people reach out that are just talking about how all chief of my police like the guy's having an affair, he's doing this, he's taking bribes from I'm like what the hell? Like you know the the amount of feedback we get from I'm sure we'll get it from this episode. Yeah, it's, it's wild and it's like what are we doing to change this? Like how?

Speaker 2: 24:20

absolutely nothing. They're doing absolutely nothing if.

Speaker 1: 24:23

If anything, it's getting worse.

Speaker 2: 24:24

Yeah, you know what I mean, and it's all political driven. Yes, you know what I mean. Everything falls to politics, mm-hmm.

Speaker 2: 24:29

You know I mean. What do you think? How do you become chief? You're appointed by whatever, whether it's the state government or the county government or the city government, town, whatever it may be. That government is appointing you to that position. Why are they appointing you there? Because you're who they want, because they can control you. Think about it. It's not voted. You know what I mean. They pick who they want to pick. It's an appointed position, just like a sheriff Sheriffs run. They're political figures. They run for office. Chiefs of police, don't? You apply and you're hired, but you're still picked by a city council or a mayor or a governor or whatever it may be.

Speaker 1: 25:06

I mean, what does that do to morale inside of a station when you're fighting for your life just on every call because you're afraid that someone's going to say something, and then now, all of a sudden, you're the bad guy? Oh, it's terrible, dude.

Speaker 2: 25:19

It's the end of police work. It's the end of police work, man. It's getting out of control. That's why I mean, that's one of the reasons why you don't see a lot of people want to be cops anymore. You can go get a job as a cop anywhere, because nobody's applying for it, you know, I mean nobody's applying for it. Um, for, like the academy I went through, I went through with 50, some guys like, and now, like the last class I went and spoke, I had like 17. Really, yeah, dude, they're just not there. The applicants aren't there. You can't blame them. No, you can't blame them at all.

Speaker 1: 25:43

I would you couldn't and I mean this with all disrespect you couldn't pay me enough money to be a fucking cop.

Speaker 2: 25:48

Nope, not right now. I'm glad I'm out old school police.

Speaker 1: 25:51

Wherever you can, snatch dudes up and yeah, you hit your point across.

Speaker 1: 25:54

Do the job you can police. Yeah, and that's where it's. It's got to be so frustrating. It's frustrating just hearing the stories. But you get some, these guys that are working more like you know inner city stuff, where you have to. Yeah, you got to be on their level. You got to be able to talk to them a certain way, man, you got to be able to put hands on and snatch some dudes up if you need to, but then at the same time, you could also be cool with them and you're on the same level as long as they're showing you respect. I mean, there's a lot of relationships like that, but these guys are getting hammered for having a relationship with these. Why would you want everybody to be your enemy? It's wild man, but it almost like these. This admin like the more, the more trouble that is caused. Like I don't know if it comes down to funding they get. It's weird.

Speaker 2: 26:36

I mean it's always an issue in first responder world, especially law enforcement. For sure, it's just terrible, like that whole, like um movement for like defund the police and all that kind of shit like don't defund them, dude, give them more money.

Speaker 2: 26:49

There's no money for training my whole career. I saw the hey, can I go this train? No, go find free training at this place. That's like the same thing you take every year. It's just monotonous. It doesn't do anything for you. You know what I mean. It's just it's terrible man that's another whole thing.

Speaker 1: 27:03

mean I've talked about it on this show before, but the whole defund, the police thing came out, don't get me wrong.

Speaker 2: 27:11

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 27:12

I've had my run-ins with law enforcement over the years. I used to run from cops all the time on my bike, my little one. We were riding our Evo. I'm like, hey, if cops come after like, go out. A little, I did too when, I was younger.

Speaker 1: 27:23

It was just how I grew up, you know, and like doing wheelies and getting caught. That was all that my trouble caused by me, right. But when this whole defund, the police thing came out, the first thing was like if we're bitching about these cops not arresting people properly, not being able to handle weapons correctly, not being able to de-escalate situations, if we take the money away, they're getting even less training. If we fund the police exactly and give them all of the ability to go through all this the training, de-escalation, how to talk situations down, everything that cops need to do to the highest standard and they're going through those trainings, then I feel all the responsibility falls on our law enforcement officers because they've had a chance to go through all their training.

Speaker 1: 28:10

You're not spending military guys out with no training and sending them into a town, right, they waste the whole entire town and be like oh, I thought that went through yeah like you have to give these guys the training, but when we're taking it away, like it just, it never made any sense to me how anybody would sit there and be like, yeah, let's take the money away from law enforcement officers and expect them to do better yeah, it makes no sense, dude and that people were like, yeah, this is a great idea yeah, because they want to get rid of cops.

Speaker 1: 28:35

That's what it was that side of the aisle wants to get rid of cops. For sure, yeah, for sure. All this land and it's working.

Speaker 2: 28:40

Yeah, it has worked. I mean look at that. I mean police, police is down, applications are down, crimes up.

Speaker 1: 28:47

I mean it's terrible, man, I don't. I mean, I hear guys like man, I was thinking about being a cop. I got a buddy of mine, his son wants to be a cop and I was like why, no, join? Join the fucking mill, go be.

Speaker 2: 28:55

Go be an electrician yeah, I tell my kid all the time I'm like I, I didn't go, I wasn't in the military, but I'd rather him go serve in the military and find a job there than go be a cop.

Speaker 1: 29:05

For sure you know what I mean. And it's sad that it's like that. Yeah, because he was the first people that we call yeah.

Speaker 2: 29:09

Yeah, and then I look at some of the cops that show up to you. How do they look? Mm-hmm, terrible, out of shape. Look like dog shit Chew bubble gum. There's no PT standards anymore anywhere. It's terrible. It drives me nuts, man.

Speaker 1: 29:25

And how do you I mean, and how do you take somebody serious when they get out of their car Looking like chew bubble gum? And they got, yeah yeah, you got five pounds of shit stuffed in, or 10 pounds of shit stuffed in a five pound bag. Yep, it's terrible. And you? Just what is this guy?

Speaker 2: 29:39

going to do Exactly. I can out-walk him Exactly. Yeah, man, exactly. It's terrible.

Speaker 1: 29:45

I think our law enforcement should almost fall under the military in some sort of way. I think it should be a branch that comes off of it. I mean, you go to all these other countries. All of their law enforcement are all military.

Speaker 2: 29:59

A lot of them have national police forces. Yeah, you know what I mean. You have the? U, you know the US Marshals or like the VA or whatever, like a national police force. I'm not saying they should or shouldn't have one, but that's what a lot of countries do. They have one police department for the country.

Speaker 1: 30:11

Yeah, and that way, your standards, you can hold standards across the board.

Speaker 2: 30:14

Yeah, Right country, all operating differently in ways. Nope, you know what I mean. So, um, like I said, I'm not saying one's good or one's bad, one's better than the other, I don't know, but I'm just saying compared to how other countries do it yeah, it seems like it would make sense but it's like we have to do something because I feel the, the everyone's on a different page.

Speaker 1: 30:37

the decline right now is is is scary. I mean I was talking to a guy not too long ago and he went through his class and there was hundreds of people in his class and he said the same thing. He went back down and there was like six people and this was in Texas, a department in Texas and he's like, yes, six people graduated, or something like that. I'm like how do you sustain your numbers like that?

Speaker 2: 30:56

You don't. You know what I mean. I don't know.

Speaker 1: 30:59

I think our law enforcement departments every one of them need to go through a full audit, along with our correctional facilities.

Speaker 2: 31:05

Yeah, doge that's what they need, you know. I mean there should be a doge for every state 100. Yeah, I mean I agree, I agree with that and it should fall under anything's federal or state run.

Speaker 1: 31:15

It should all have to go through that, because I mean not even to get off police work, but you start digging into the correctional facilities oh yeah, and I mean obviously you. You spent 19 years yeah how many years were you a cop for a night?

Speaker 2: 31:28

uh. So I got shot in my 17th year and then two years recovery and retired in my 18th year okay.

Speaker 1: 31:35

So 19 years you've seen people in and out of the system and it's like our correctional facilities are worse off sending somebody there than just letting them. Like a drug dealer right, you get caught up Kid gets caught up, with a couple grams of weed on him. Now he gets pulled right into these gangs yeah. And then you have to survive in these prisons. So you have to fall into a group Yep, can't blame them, I would yeah, you got to survive Right. Group yep, can't blame them, I would yeah, you gotta survive right. And then now you're gang associated or affiliated, so that that's going on your record. Then they're gonna have you. You're the young guy carry out whatever they need you to do. Then you get hit with that. So now you're stacking time on and here you are. Originally got caught with a little bit of weed or coke or something stupid and you're not even like a hazard to society.

Speaker 1: 32:24

You just got caught with some drugs and then now you're a full-on gangbanger in the correctional facility in your pocket yeah, like that to me blows my mind. Blows my mind like how is this? How do we as a country say here, be like, yeah, this is working?

Speaker 2: 32:37

I don't know man same thing with our law I don't know the answer, man, I just know it's fucked up. You know I don't know the answers, but it's messed up, there's for sure crooked people and money involved. That's, that's every side's, everywhere, everywhere. I agree with that insane.

Speaker 1: 32:49

Yeah, all right, let's get into some police stories.

Speaker 2: 32:51

Yeah, I want to hear you ever getting a chase. Oh yeah, I've been in lots of chases. First police chase, first police chase, remember it, oh man, um, my first one back. I don't remember my first one. I remember back when, like when I was a seasonal cop, um, we got chasing some drunk, got kicked out of a bar and the guy was massive dude, like I'm five, nine, right like 170 pounds, but then I was probably like you know 150 pounds or something. Um, this guy gotten like guy, got kicked out of the bar, big dude, me and another guy chased him, tackled him and the guy started doing push-ups with us on his back. He was a monster. He was a football player at University of Wisconsin.

Speaker 1: 33:34

He was a linebacker.

Speaker 2: 33:36

I remember the guy's name, not that I would say it anyway, but yeah, he was a monster dude. He ended up just being nice and giving up. He was a monster dude. He ended up just like being nice and giving up. We chased him like three blocks, just gassed out or what he gassed out, um, and he got tired and gassed out. Then he tripped and fell, like hit the curb, and then we got on top of him. I tried to cuff him.

Speaker 1: 33:53

He was just like banging him out, like boom, boom, boom and I was like, oh shit, man, we're in trouble, we're in trouble, dude.

Speaker 2: 33:59

He was like, all right, I'm good and he, like put his hands behind his back and I was like oh, God, dude, but that's the kind of shit you dealt with as a summer cop.

Speaker 1: 34:05

Just stupid drunk stuff. You know what I mean. I bet you the drunks dealing with, because I come from a little tourist town. It's not as bad, but I know how those towns are.

Speaker 2: 34:13

There's just every Friday, Saturday night you know you're getting in a fight. Yeah, want to give you a funny fight story. Oh, man, a funny fight story. I'll give you a funny story. This isn't even a pursuit related, this is just a funny story. This is towards the tail end of my career. I was in K-9 at the time but my dog wasn't using this complaint. We got called to a house for a guy. It was like a disorderly complaint. We get there and the guy is probably like his mid-late 20s. He was big guy, right, probably about your size. He was big dude, um, and he was running around his yard screaming and yelling, butt naked, covered in vaseline from head to toe, and he took his cell phone and sho shoved it up his butt. What he was. Crazy, this crazy guy. The department ended up going out there like three times like different occasions, to deal with this guy. He was just a nut job.

Speaker 2: 35:13

One of those like a frequent flyer Freak, yeah, frequent flyer and just nuts like naughty on their squirrel shit dude. Yeah, I was just fucking.

Speaker 1: 35:20

Covered in Vaseline with a phone up his ass, heads and toes, bald head, everything just covered.

Speaker 2: 35:25

Took a cell phone. I don't know if it was Android or Apple, I don't know, but we don't know. That's impressive, impressive. Yeah, he did that like three times.

Speaker 1: 35:36

I don't know if, and then he would just call the cops or somebody would call him.

Speaker 2: 35:38

Neighbors would call one time he went there and he was like throwing like syringes at us and stuff. Um god, he was crazy dude. Yeah, but that was like somebody at this point or what, I can't remember how they I think he gave up every time.

Speaker 2: 35:49

Eventually it was kind of like de-escalate this real quick because nobody wanted to touch him I remember when I was out there, he like talked him down, handcuffed him and then like took him to the hospital to like be evaluated and everything fish. If nobody was like, I was like how you gonna go hands-on with this dude? You can't, you're just going to slip off this guy.

Speaker 1: 36:03

What's the movie with Will Ferrell when they start lathering themselves? It might be Will Ferrell where they oil themselves up.

Speaker 2: 36:11

Oh yeah, that one. They joined for fraternity or something. Yeah, they're like 40 years old and got into fraternity. He comes up all like-. Snoop Dogg was in that, I think. Yeah, it was like that.

Speaker 1: 36:24

See, I feel as a cop. I would just walk up and just be like, yeah, I wouldn't even hesitate, yeah, that's the policing that I feel we need to get back to. Instead of like get on the ground, get on the ground, I would say things like Put the vaseline down this guy again. Yeah, when you get those types of calls and you know it's one of your frequent flyers, do you like take your time? Are you stopping at all? Like yellow lights and like hoping somebody?

Speaker 2: 36:50

else is going to get there first, right.

Speaker 1: 36:52

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 36:52

That probably happens a lot yeah.

Speaker 1: 36:54

That's how I would go.

Speaker 2: 36:55

Yeah, let's do it again, especially if you know like what it is.

Speaker 1: 37:06

You're like I got to help an old lady across the street.

Speaker 2: 37:08

I'm not getting there first because I got to take the paper. You know what I mean. Oh yeah, I mean, how do you write that up Very quick? I don't know it was. I remember that one that was a long time ago. That was like that was probably 2013 or something. Yeah, I remember that.

Speaker 1: 37:18

Yeah, that was funny as shit. What's one of the most memorable police moments that you had? Oh man because you went street and then obviously you rotated to canine, right? Yeah, I did, I was fortunate man I had.

Speaker 2: 37:31

I was. I came from a department of like 40 guys, 35, 40 cops, um so it was hard to get like special unit spots because there's only so many yeah people usually tend to stay there for as long as I can sure. I was fortunate um. I did canine for six or seven years. Um I was on the crocs detective for a few years. Us marshal status force um canine I did. So I was pretty fortunate um what?

Speaker 1: 37:58

was the question you had. I've got off track. If there's when you think, close your eyes and think about all the crazy, crazy shit you've been through, what's the one story that pops out?

Speaker 2: 38:07

Oh, being shot.

Speaker 1: 38:08

Decides to be a shot.

Speaker 2: 38:11

A cool canine story. I was working one night and I was helping out the drug unit. They were watching a house, they were dealing out of it. Whatever this guy came out, they say he did like a hand-in-hand. He came out. And then they he did like a hand-in-hand, he came out, and then they lost him on surveillance. So then I picked the guy up on another street so I was like I called it out. I was like I'm gonna jump out and stop this guy. I have my dog with me. So I get out, stop the guy on the sidewalk, hop out. Hey, man blahpped over the curb, fell. The guy jumped on top of me like mount, full mount, and I was like fuck man. So I had the door pop for my dog on my belt.

Speaker 2: 38:54

So I hit the door popper to let my dog out. So my door pop went off, my horn would beep like boop. He heard it and he turned around like what was that? He heard it and he turned around like what was that? And he noticed like the dog was coming. So he got up off me, ran around the back of the car. My dog, who came out on the other side of the vehicle, came around the front of my car like stopped and looked at me and I was like go get him, Go get him. So he like chased the guy down, caught him across the street, ate the guy up. Pretty good, but that was a really memorable story for me.

Speaker 1: 39:22

Okay, that was a really memorable story for me. Okay, so as a canine cop, I got to ask when you turn your dog on to somebody and it just bites the fuck out of them, is there something inside of you like? Get him, get him I mean, is it one of those the?

Speaker 2: 39:35

first time is horrifying. You're sending an animal to go eat someone.

Speaker 1: 39:39

Okay, yeah, it's kind of like should I do this? Yeah, it's a heat. Should I do this? Yeah, it's a hesitation missile dude with teeth.

Speaker 2: 39:45

You know what I mean oh yeah. So you're like the first one, I was kind of like nervous and then after that was like I could get used to this, yeah, yeah, especially if it's like something like I mean every time you send a dog it gets. It's serious it's serious. Yes, I mean, it's always like you always have a reason. It's, it's you know, um, but yeah, it's like it's cool, man, especially when it's well-deserved. Yeah, I mean, um, yeah, it's a cool feeling.

Speaker 1: 40:11

How many bites I mean, did you?

Speaker 2: 40:13

I had seven um, which for my department was a lot of bites, so I have like one a year which is pretty good. Um, he was a good tracker man. I was very real. I was really fortunate to have a good tracking dog. Okay, he was just naturally, he was just awesome. So you pick it up. Yeah, he was good, are?

Speaker 1: 40:31

they, I mean, are they picking up on? Is it like skin cells and stuff that they?

Speaker 2: 40:37

yeah, run is it sweat and all that kind of stuff.

Speaker 1: 40:39

I mean they're able to just yeah, what kind of was a malamar or shepherd? Okay?

Speaker 2: 40:44

I wanted a Mal. They picked the trainer that where we trained at. They pick your dog for you. They try to pair you up. I wanted a Mal and he was like no, you're getting a Shepherd. I'm like okay, so I got a Shepherd. I hated him at first. Really, I hated my God yeah, yeah, it tore me up, man. I hated him Even like when we graduated, like things were working because we graduated, but I was still like I don't know about this guy.

Speaker 1: 41:13

Are you bringing him home? Is he part of the family?

Speaker 2: 41:14

Yeah, he's part of the family. Okay. And then, up until Cause it was very early on after I graduated police academy or a canine school, um, that I had that deployment where that guy got on top of me, and as soon as that happened I was like that's my guy.

Speaker 1: 41:30

And you guys bonded.

Speaker 2: 41:30

That's my dog, yeah.

Speaker 1: 41:32

So you, so you bonded with your canine right then and there after your first bite, yeah, I love this. That's pretty cool. I mean if, if for your position and going through all that training and that happening.

Speaker 2: 41:42

Yeah, man, that's one thing. People always ask me what was the funnest thing about your career? Blah, blah, blah. And I'm like well, the funnest thing I ever did was working with the martial service. But the most rewarding thing I ever did was K-9. Because that was something that you only got out of, that what you put into it. If you were successful it's because you put the work in to get there right, because it's a team effort. If you didn't have such a hot career with it, it's because you know you didn't put the effort in.

Speaker 1: 42:08

What type of work are you putting in Like? Are you trying to get training hours?

Speaker 2: 42:11

Yeah, working on your tracking, your scent work. You know your bite work, your recalls. If you're going to, you know your day. I mean, I did obedience with him every day before my shift started.

Speaker 1: 42:26

Really.

Speaker 2: 42:26

Yep, and then even on night work when we did like because I worked permanent nights most of my canine career we had to go like do property checks, you know, make sure businesses are locked and shit like that. So every time I got out and did that and walked like a complex or a business, I always had him with me and I was working on obedience every time we walked.

Speaker 1: 42:44

Was he drug?

Speaker 2: 42:44

trained, or is he just a bite dog? Yeah, yeah, Drugs and and um and bite yeah.

Speaker 1: 42:49

So did he? I mean he ever find any? Did he ever? Did your dog ever find like a good bust, or yeah he?

Speaker 2: 42:58

was yeah, we found um a lot of. We always found a lot of heroin really heroin was big, big out there really.

Speaker 2: 43:05

Yeah, um, a lot of heroines, crack, you get marijuana once a while, but nobody gives a shit. Yeah, um, but yeah, heroin mostly. Yeah, no shit, uh, so we, we did, we worked on a lot of search warrants and stuff, um, and then I was on SWAT at the time, which our SWAT team is like a part-time team, so it's like, yeah, volunteer, and then you do that, you know, um, so, uh, so we, I also got certified at a canine SWAT team is like a part-time team, so it's like you work patrol and then you do that, you know. So I also got certified at a canine SWAT school with him, so he deployed on SWAT with me. Oh really, yeah, so we did a lot of stuff with that. It was fun, man.

Speaker 1: 43:34

Really. Yeah, it was really cool, so he's right there with you for everything.

Speaker 2: 43:37

Everything man. Yeah, it was cool. Nah, he passed away unexpectedly July 5th 2017.

Speaker 1: 43:46

Damn dude sorry finished up.

Speaker 2: 43:48

We were on day work. Finished up day work. It was July 4th. He got sick, finished up day work, took him to the emergency vet that night. He was like all lethargic and then he died at like 3 3 in the morning on July 5th. Oh shit, he called me. He was like he didn't make it. Yeah, oh shit, he called me and was like he didn't make it. Yeah, cancer.

Speaker 1: 44:06

Didn't know he had it. Yep Went through that. I went through that with my servers. I could come walking in the door one night and my wife's like something's wrong with him. I'm like swooped him up, went to the vet and that was it.

Speaker 2: 44:14

Yeah, you just don't know, man, mm-mm. Yeah, hurts, I feel this day it still hurts me, I feel, yeah, so, and then that was my last dog I had. Yeah, yeah, you were done with it. I wanted another one. Really, I just didn't work out with the administration and they felt my path was somewhere different at that point so after the canine would you transition to?

Speaker 1: 44:37

is that where you went, marshals?

Speaker 2: 44:38

yeah. So I wanted another dog. Um, they pretty much said, no, why it? What happened? They said it was they felt I needed to move on and do other things. I was at that time becoming a more senior officer in the department, so they wanted to give other guys a crack at having a dog, okay, and they wanted to see me advance my career a little further. I didn't like that. I didn't want to.

Speaker 1: 45:02

That's where I wanted to be.

Speaker 2: 45:03

I was like I'm going to get another dog, maybe another one after that, and retire in K-9. I'd be happy. Yeah, I didn't care about promotions and shit. So they're like no, basically you can go back to the road as an assistant shift commander or you can take the drug unit spot that's open. So I went to the drug unit and then, six months into the drug unit, I added the Marshal's Task Force to it, so I was doing two jobs at once.

Speaker 1: 45:24

What's the drug unit? What is your day-to-day on a drug unit?

Speaker 2: 45:27

Plainclothes detective. So you're working informants, you're doing drug buys yourself, just building cases.

Speaker 1: 45:34

Yeah, is it scary doing a drug buy.

Speaker 2: 45:36

It's very nerve-wracking. Yeah, it can get, especially in the beginning.

Speaker 1: 45:45

You've someone because you're like how do you act? Like a robot. You know what I?

Speaker 2: 45:47

mean, I'm not a cop, yeah, right, yeah, buy this heroin, some weed you know what I mean.

Speaker 1: 45:50

Um, I feel like cops.

Speaker 2: 45:50

You can just sniff them out of my own cocaine for sale um, it was fun, man, yeah, yeah, I had a lot of fun with it. I didn't buy a lot of drugs directly. I did a few times, um, it was fun, but usually I, if I could use an informant to do it, I do'd do it just for safety matters. You know what I mean.

Speaker 1: 46:05

How do you get informants? Are they coming to you or you catch them?

Speaker 2: 46:07

Sometimes they'll come to you because they want money or whatever it may be.

Speaker 1: 46:11

Oh, so informants get paid.

Speaker 2: 46:12

Yeah, you'll have a fund. Okay, it's usually grant money. You'll have grant money for drug investigations. You can pay them through this, with this money, this fund, for that, where a lot of times like they'll want cigarettes, so you like give them cigarettes.

Speaker 1: 46:25

Yeah, dude, it's crazy, yeah, so these dudes are just ratting people out for cigarettes.

Speaker 2: 46:29

Ratting people out for a cig man yeah, just for a simple lung dart, that's all they want. Oh shit, that's so nice.

Speaker 1: 46:35

We were dealing with that in Iraq. These dudes, all they wanted was smokes. Other route, I'm not lying. Same thing dude. Draw you a map, the worst it was and all for I'll take it there right now.

Speaker 2: 46:45

Just give me that newt. You know what I mean? All right, yeah, menthol, go away. We got it. Um, and then sometimes it'd be like someone got locked up and they're like, oh, can I get this to a misdemeanor? And you call the attorney, like the prosecutors, all of a sudden. See if they can work off the charge or whatever for information, or whatever it may be.

Speaker 1: 46:59

Yeah, yeah no, it was fun, it was interesting. Yeah, what was fun about that?

Speaker 2: 47:03

I mean, obviously, um, just like it was just different than working in a black and white car handling a fucking domestic or a shoplifter. You know, like you got to see the other side of things, like when you're on the street as a cop, like you're out there handling all these things in these areas, but now you're like immersed in that in this area, and playing clothes with like your long hair and you're sitting in cars with these people, talking to them actually on their level and you can you know what I mean, um, and you're getting to see another perspective of it, kind of which I really thought was interesting. You know, okay, you know, um, you don't always get to see everybody's like when you're out in the street as a cop, you don't get to see the other side of everything, like their perspective of things, for sure, and now you do because you're entrenched in it you're entrenched in it, man um it's a dirty world.

Speaker 1: 47:47

I mean dealing with drugs, with anything, it's just I mean you're helping them deal with their issues.

Speaker 2: 47:51

You know, I mean really, yeah. I mean, like you know, um, they're working off drug chargers or shoplifting charges or you know wherever it may be, but it's like you're here they, you become friends with them, because that's a job to build trust. Right, with informants you have to build trust. So you're talking to them, you're hearing their stories, you know what they have going on, you know what's their ups and downs.

Speaker 2: 48:11

Like you're hearing all this shit and you know, sometimes you try to help them out when you can and other times, just like you know, there's nothing you can do for them. You know, yeah, um, I I enjoyed that part of it. I enjoyed seeing the other other side side of things.

Speaker 1: 48:22

Does that feel like more, like more of police work rather?

Speaker 2: 48:25

than made it more human for me. Okay, does that make sense? Yeah, um, you're not just running a beat every day I just run to be like dealing with this person, boom On to the next one, boom On to the next one. Like these are people like when you build a relationship, you know I mean, you don't put a relationship where you're putting all your trust into them, you're not telling them all your, your life story, you know I mean, but you're, it just makes things more human for you for me anyway that's, that's how my experience was with it.

Speaker 1: 48:58

I can't say for everybody, for me, that's what it was were there ever informants that you were, you were dealing with where you just were like this dude is no good.

Speaker 2: 49:05

Yeah, most of them. Yeah, really Get out of here. Really, yeah, dude yeah.

Speaker 1: 49:09

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 49:10

I've had informants feed me bullshit information before.

Speaker 1: 49:12

Just for a couple bucks or a pack of cigarettes? Yeah, and you know they're lying to you.

Speaker 2: 49:18

You never know for sure. Sometimes you know them and then sometimes you're like this just just sounds too good to be true.

Speaker 1: 49:23

get out of here did they ever tell you shit that just blew your mind like you would they just?

Speaker 2: 49:27

open. Oh man, yeah, I had this one one time. Tell me like you're gonna hit this house. There's gonna be a wall safe behind this picture, and you're like, all right, okay, you have a search warrant for the house already because of other buys. You've done okay, because I always try more. I always try to use more than one informant at each thing, just to have another sense of information. Does that help in court? I think so. Yeah for me, because now you're not just relying on the word and information you get from one person.

Speaker 2: 49:55

You can correlate it to a whole other person that's not connected. They don't know each other because informants don't know each other are informants.

Speaker 1: 50:01

Okay, but I had this one.

Speaker 2: 50:03

One time I had multiple informants buying out this one house and then this is the only informant that was like there's a wall safe and it's behind this photo in the hallway. And I'm like, yeah right, dude, there's no fucking wall safe anywhere in that house. I'm like why did you make up a story about a wall safe?

Speaker 2: 50:18

he's like it was there they're just stupid shit and I'm like, okay, well, you're done. You know, I mean like you were making it easy like 40 bucks, and now you're like dumb because you lied to some stupid ass story about a wall safe for no reason. You know, I mean just wanted to confirm it or just making shit up making shit up?

Speaker 1: 50:32

I guess I don't. They're weird, people are weird, so what? I mean, what's an informant make?

Speaker 2: 50:35

so if I, I mean it all varies on how the cop, the cop, the agency or whatever you choose to be. I was paying them like 40 bucks for a buy or something like 60 bucks sometimes for a buy.

Speaker 1: 50:45

Really.

Speaker 2: 50:46

Yeah, you got to keep up with the competition because other departments might be paying this and this department might be paying this.

Speaker 1: 50:51

Wait, wait, wait, wait. It's not like a minimum wage thing. So other departments are paying informants.

Speaker 2: 50:56

Yeah, because sometimes another agency may be like hey, I use this guy for this case up here. He, this case up here is really good. He's got information in your town. If you want to use them and you're like, what are you paying him? He's like I've been getting him like 60 bucks, so I'm probably keep it close to that and I'm like all right, like so, yeah, no shit.

Speaker 1: 51:16

Yeah, yeah, yeah, man, they'll like, they'll, they'll, they'll like. Barter a deal with you, dude, yeah yeah.

Speaker 2: 51:21

It's like negotiating a deal with them. The criminal mind is hilarious, I'll give you a 40 and a carton of Newports. You know what I mean.

Speaker 1: 51:28

Yeah, just for some information. For some information. I could see that being way more entertaining than just driving around circles all day.

Speaker 2: 51:35

It was so much fun. It gets old after a while because you're just dealing with these shitheads all the time. To be honest with I really enjoyed it yeah.

Speaker 1: 51:42

No kidding dude, that would. I think I would enjoy that part of it. It was cool man.

Speaker 2: 51:46

Like I said, you get to see a whole other side of things, for sure. Another world dude. Yeah, yeah, it was cool.

Speaker 1: 51:50

And then from there you said six months in, you got on with the marshals.

Speaker 2: 52:02

Six months into the drug unit, yeah, which is like a task force officer. So they assign you there and then you're strictly doing violent fugitives, that's it. So anything from like burglaries, rapes to homicides, You're finding them. Yeah, your department comes down with a case. Hey, we got this guy wanted for attempted murder. Blah, blah, blah blah. Here's everything we know.

Speaker 1: 52:22

Go find him and you work that case and you go track them down, whether they're in your town or they're across country. You really go find them. Yeah, it was cool. That was an awesome job. How badass was that. It was sweet. I loved it, man, because you're not dealing with the day in and day out shit.

Speaker 2: 52:37

You get tasked with a case or a person, yep, or like, say, like you know, um, I work in melford, delaware, assigned the marshal's task force, but you know, phoenix, arizona, has a guy. I wanted for something and he's in this area in delaware. Here's the case file. Here's what we have. Can you guys track him down?

Speaker 1: 52:53

yep, so you're just a bounty hunter, in a way like a bounty hunter dude?

Speaker 2: 52:57

yeah, you just track people down, man. Oh shit.

Speaker 1: 52:59

Yeah, are you working with bounty hunters and other agencies, or is this all like?

Speaker 2: 53:01

yeah, it's, um, I mean, you work with some other agencies for sure, you're always doing that, uh, but it's, you have your team of of marshals and you just go out work cases together.

Speaker 1: 53:11

Man, really, plain clothes, plain vehicles what was one of the worst cases you had to work uh, getting shot.

Speaker 2: 53:20

Um, we had a lot of. We worked a lot of like that year leading up to my shooting. We worked a lot of cases that year. We had a lot of. We worked a lot of like that year leading up to my shooting. We worked a lot of cases that year. We had 15, give or take, we had like 15 task force officers in the state but my team specifically day to day was like four guys Okay, me and three other guys and we worked 100, or we apprehended 136 violent fugitives that year and I think like 27 were homicide suspects. Really, yeah, we stayed pretty busy. I'd say so, yeah, it was funnest job I ever had. Dude, no shit. I loved every second of it. Yeah, yeah, I wanted to go back to it.

Speaker 1: 53:58

I loved it that much yeah, I got one of my best friends when I was. We were rack mates at boot camp. We've sit on the yellow footprints in Parris Island together. He's a marshal now but he deals with a lot of like the passport frauds and all that, so he gets to hunt all those people down that are coming.

Speaker 2: 54:12

The marshals do a lot of things people wouldn't realize. These are all over the world. Yeah, they do a lot of stuff.

Speaker 1: 54:28

They see I couldn't do that shit. I want to. I want to have somebody on to talk about, just like what goes. But I have my hats off to any of those people that can work those cases and have to watch the fight, because you know, women they're always into like murder mysteries and all that shit yeah, I don't like that stuff either, and every time I go down there and my wife always watching, they're like god. They went through seven terabytes of child pornography. I'm like who?

Speaker 2: 54:46

who is? I know guys have done that. It's brutal.

Speaker 1: 54:50

Yeah, it's brutal, man see that I think at that point like I would rather hang it up than have to live with that shit I know guys I have and I know you're, I know you're helping and obviously the kids need help and these people need to burn in hell, but for me.

Speaker 2: 55:02

I, I know, guys, I've retired early because of that, for sure. I couldn't do the job anywhere. They had to get out, yeah yeah, that would tear me up. I'd much rather be chasing some idiot idiot with violent, violent criminal, then I'll go chase down the guys that did that kind of shit, for sure. I don't want to investigate the case of what they did, though.

Speaker 1: 55:21

No, just give me the case of where they are there's a special place in heaven for people that go through and can watch that shit and build a case up to put them away. And then our judicial system they get off and yeah, they're out there.

Speaker 2: 55:33

Yeah, that's crazy man.

Speaker 1: 55:34

Wow, I know mine, it's mind-boggling at least set up, yeah I mean so as a marshal. I mean so you guys are, when it comes down to you get like a, like a list of, or is it just one case at a time, or do you guys have things laid out?

Speaker 2: 55:50

for you. So like if my agency had a violent fugitive, they would just pass off to me, I worked the case. Or like if another surrounding agency had one, they would call the Marshal's office. Hey, we have this case, if you guys can work it. They'd be like, oh, oh, who's the closest task force officer to them? Oh, tj is, we'll give it to him. So like, hey, we got this case from such and such agency. Can you work this? Get up with them for the information.

Speaker 1: 56:13

Yep, and then I work so then you get the information and then what happens? Like what? What's the the process of finding somebody that's on the us marshal's wanted list?

Speaker 2: 56:21

uh, I mean, you have another number of resources you can use which I won't get into on here. But um, I mean, dude, simple google search on shit man. Social media, really, yeah, old addresses, new addresses, girlfriends, boyfriends, family members you just go through a list of shit and start pinpointing stuff and are the majority of them pretty easy?

Speaker 1: 56:39

or are you some of them, man? Some of them are tricky as shit. What makes it tricky?

Speaker 2: 56:41

uh, some people just turn in the ghost man really, some people are just good, they shit what makes it tricky? Some people just turn into ghosts. Man, really, some people are just good, they're just turning into ghosts. Some people are just smart.

Speaker 1: 56:49

What makes them a ghost? How do you disappear?

Speaker 2: 56:53

Not using debit card payments, avoiding known areas that you might frequent, like family members or towns or whatever it may be. Vehicles you know Traveling at night, whatever it may be um vehicles, you know um traveling at night, whatever it may be. People, frequent flyers man, they're slick, you know. I mean, they've been through the system um, so they know how to get around stuff. But eventually you're gonna get caught, you're not gonna I've never had anybody.

Speaker 1: 57:16

We didn't find eventually, really.

Speaker 2: 57:18

Nah, we always, every, every case we had, we found them eventually. They might not be like local, they might have been like in mexico and we had to like notify mexico or wherever it was, but they were found eventually is it fun tracking people down like that and going through like their life and talking to people?

Speaker 2: 57:32

yeah, it was so much fun. Dude, it was a cat and mouse. Yeah, cops and robbers. Man, it was such I loved it sitting and doing surveillance on places, really like somewhere, just waiting to see somebody walk out of the door show their face in the window.

Speaker 1: 57:43

Like I loved it okay, so what's all right, I could get behind that, like what. So what's it like sitting on on a surveillance on a house or somewhere? Then you finally see the person.

Speaker 2: 57:54

You've been waiting for it's boring as shit until all that work pays off and you see like an eyeball pop out and you're like that's his eyeball. I know it is you know, what mean?

Speaker 2: 58:02

It looks just like his eye. You know what I mean. Looking for anything. Looking for anything, dude. It's rewarding, dude, when you put in all that time and effort, because I mean it's a lot of hours man Time away from family, family events and shit. I mean it's we were in it to win it, dude. I mean early mornings, like whatever it took. We were fucking in it and that's why we were successful. That's why we had so many cases that final year. But it taxes you.

Speaker 1: 58:30

Oh, man Taxes you, I bet.

Speaker 2: 58:31

Your personal time, for sure, but it's rewarding, man. You put all that work in. You finally find that shit bag you've been looking for, that tried to kill somebody or did kill somebody or rape somebody, like it's rewarding, rewarding dude.

Speaker 1: 58:40

Okay, so you find them. Yeah, you find this person. You've been tracking, hunting down yeah, wanted for murder. What's the process at this point? Are you getting a team, you calling in SWAT?

Speaker 2: 58:50

yeah, it depends. Sometimes we'd call SWAT just because you know more the merrier and they have more tools than we have and stuff, even though we're all certified and trained, we're all SWAT operators. Yeah, um, you want a team put together for some stuff. And then sometimes it was was like yeah, we got like eight guys here, let's go, let's hit this door real quick, bing bang, boom. You know what I mean. Really, it varied on the case.

Speaker 1: 59:11

Yeah, besides obviously you being shot, were you ever in any shootouts?

Speaker 2: 59:16

No, I had been around shootings. I had never had to pull my weapon and fire it.

Speaker 1: 59:20

Okay.

Speaker 2: 59:20

That Okay, that was my first time I put my weapon On those kinds of cases. Your weapon's always out, yeah, never had to pull a trigger, thankfully.

Speaker 1: 59:28

Yeah, Until that one day yeah. No shit, let's dive into that. Yeah, man, take me through the day that you got shot serving a warrant, december 10th. What was the warrant for? Let's just start there. Captain Hamazad. Okay, so december 10th. What was the warrant for? Let's just start there. Tempted homicide okay, so you knew this dude was obviously yeah dangerous dangerous. And this is. We were working as a marshal at this point.

Speaker 2: 59:52

Yep, okay um december 10th 2020. Um, it was a thursday. It was like any other work day. Man went to, went to work early, worked some cases all day doing whatever I don't remember exactly we did and then got home like a decent time it's like five o'clock, um, getting dinner ready with the family and shit. And then, um, we all, we operate off like group texts for the team, you know, yeah.

Speaker 2: 1:00:14

So our supervisor put a test get a task or text out and was like hey, who's available? Pennsylvania has a guy I wanted for attempted homicide and he's thought to be at this hotel. And we wanted who's available for like 06. So everyone's like, oh, I'm available. Blah, blah, blah. And I was looking at the intel sheet and I was like, ah, dude, this guy's at a hotel 10 minutes from my fucking house. And I was like send me over a photo of him, vehicle information. And I was like it's 10 minutes from my house, I'll run out see if I can see him or the vehicle match tag up. That way we know, because I don't know what intel they all had.

Speaker 1: 1:00:51

I can't remember all that.

Speaker 2: 1:00:52

But they had intel he was at this hotel. I'm like, let me go verify. I'm close right. So I head out there tell my wife, hey, I'll be back in few minutes, but right now verify this.

Speaker 1: 1:01:01

And of course she's like okay, you know so you're not even going there to make an arrest, you're just going to verify, just going to verify, just get eyes on.

Speaker 2: 1:01:11

Like I said, I'm not, I'm in a, I'm in a Dodge Nitro. It's a plain Jane vehicle, ain't nothing. There's nothing police about it. Um, right out there pulling the parking lot of the hotel. Um, see the vehicle in the front row. I take up a parking spot a little ways from it, verified a tag number, vehicle description, all that shit. Call my supervisor up. Oh, man, got the vehicle right here, like he's here, the vehicle's here, he's got to be here right.

Speaker 2: 1:01:31

And as I'm on the phone, dude walks out. I'm like, oh shit, he's walking out, hold on. So he comes out and then shit starts matching up. He had a girlfriend with him, that was the intel. She walked out. Two young kids were supposed to be with him. They walked out.

Speaker 2: 1:01:45

So you're 100 match this guy, 100 looking at, looking at his photo and looking at him from like 50 yards away, I'm like that's him, dude, he was very unique. He has, uh, like hispanic um, really big guy, long like beard um, so he's very easy to spot everything. That photo was like exact, so it's very easy to spot everything. Matt photo was like exact. So, um, they load up in the car they leave.

Speaker 2: 1:02:09

I let them go because by myself number one and then number two is um, I waited till they got. I waited like five minutes for our left just to make sure if it's safe for me to leave, not be noticed. So I let them leave. I knew they weren't leaving for good. They weren't loading bags up and luggage and shit, so you knew they were going to come back. Yeah, they weren't loading any bags and luggage up. It was dinner time. They were probably going to get something to eat. You know what I mean. So let them go. I head back home and I'm getting dinner ready again and I'm just like irritated. I'm like dude, like I'm on a task force specifically for locating violent fugitives and I just found this fucking dude and the goal was to wait till tomorrow morning and go get him.

Speaker 2: 1:02:49

I'm like fuck that man. So I called the other guys on my team. They're like yeah, no, we need to go get this guy tonight, because what if he does leave in the middle of night? Or, even worse, what if he gets pulled over for some stupid ass traffic violation by some random patrol guy who doesn't know what he's dealing with and shit goes south with that right. So they all agree, supervisor agrees, he calls pennsylvania. Pennsylvania is like giddy up, have fun.

Speaker 2: 1:03:13

So I head back out there, set up in the parking lot, two of my partners show up, um, so we kind of put like a perimeter around the parking lot area. I went back to the same park spot I had before so I would blend in again. And then we had other guys coming from like the North end of the state. We had guys coming from Maryland, one of the offices in Maryland that we work with. That was like 45 minutes away. So we had like 10 or 12 guys coming total.

Speaker 2: 1:03:40

So we had to come up with a game plan as far as like, what if this dude comes back before the rest of the team gets here and it's three of us Like what are we going to do? Are we going to let him get back in the hotel, wait and let him go back in the hotel until everybody gets here. Or are we just going to say fuck it and with a three man team, we're going to try to take this guy in the parking lot? We're trying to look at the safest way to do it. Right, and our, my thought was if we let him get back and go up to that hotel while we wait. Now one, we're looking at a barricade. We're looking at a murder, suicide. He's already tried to kill one person. Um, we're looking at hostages. Hostages. We're looking at, maybe, a shootout in the door, threshold of that doorway, where we can't return fire now because there's innocent people, not to mention the other rooms around. It was a disaster, right, yeah, this is not the best scenario, right.

Speaker 2: 1:04:27

And now by this time it's like 7.30 at night. It's December. There's not a lot of people around. It's a hotel park lot. There's a Cracker Barrel next to it. Not really many people eating at Cracker Barrel on Thursday at 7.30. Now some people question well, he had the kids with him. He's always going to have the kids with him. You can't get around that. Nothing's going to be perfect, right? Yeah, so we decided, if he comes back before the rest of the team gets here, we're just going to take him. So I'm going to pin the back of the vehicle, george is going to pin the passenger side, josh is going to pin the driver's side and if he comes back in the same parking spot which is up front, he's not driving off because of the building trade there, right?

Speaker 1: 1:05:04

Yep.

Speaker 2: 1:05:05

Brick building. So, sure enough, here he comes, strolling back in the parking lot and you guys are there already. There's three of us. Yep, we had, like I said, there was four of us on the team. The fourth guy, mike, wasn't there. He was on another assignment, so it was just three of us. So he pulls back in the parking lot, does a lap around the whole building doing counter surveillance, I'm sure comes back around, pulls in a spot and I'm like execute, so we pull in. I pull in behind him. George pulls in the passenger side to pin those doors. Josh comes in to the driver's side. The goal is for him to pin the driver's side door, but he parked next to a vehicle where room blocked it, right, so it's unrelated vehicle next to him.

Speaker 2: 1:05:50

So I pull in and I come in at a really shitty angle instead of coming in directly behind it like you should have. You know, I mean, I come in. It was a tight park line and I came in at an angle that basically, when I opened my door up, it was like I'm right there, like I'm looking down the side of his vehicle, like down the driver's side. Yeah, so like as soon as I come in, um, before I'm even stopped, I already know it. I'm like fuck, I'm exposed, I already knew it, but it's too late, right, wheels are in motion. At this point you can't like oh let me start over, redo.

Speaker 2: 1:06:19

It's not happening. So, um, I have my gun out, step out. Soon as I step out, his door cracks open and I see a hand come. I see a little bit of a face. I see a hand come out and it's just boom, muzzle flashes, really About six feet. So he was ready. Yeah, he was waiting, he was ready. So muzzle flashes start kicking off.

Speaker 2: 1:06:42

I return my first round. I, I return back, goes into his door, misses him. Then he comes out on two feet, starts pumping off more rounds like you're still in your car, no, I'm out on two feet now. Okay, so I'm like six feet. I'm like from here to um, just past my wife over here, like a few feet, um. So I start moving to the right to get covered behind his vehicle and as I'm moving right, he's me.

Speaker 2: 1:07:04

I get two more rounds off. I strike him center mass. I didn't even know I hit him until a couple days later, because it was like he didn't even feel it dude, he just kept pumping right. So I don't know how many rounds he got off on me. He lands six. So the one. I don't know what world they were, but one round was through and through my left shoulder. One ran on my left hand. I had a round strike me in my plate carrier ricocheted, landed in my chin, two in my right arm and then I had one go in my right femur, just below my hip socket, and that one just dropped me.

Speaker 1: 1:07:38

Oh for sure, Back of the car, were you running or were you stationed?

Speaker 2: 1:07:42

I was moving. I was moving to my right like cover fire, like trying to get to my right, moving like sidestepping to my right. So when that round hit you, you dropped immediately, dropped me right there, just boom. Yeah, made the back quarter panel So-.

Speaker 1: 1:07:53

Did you know at that point that you were hit? I mean-.

Speaker 2: 1:07:56

I knew I was hit. I didn't know all of them, okay, the only one I could feel was my leg.

Speaker 1: 1:08:03

I've heard guys say when they've been shot, some dudes feel it immediately and then some dudes don't.

Speaker 2: 1:08:10

That was the only round that you felt. I didn't feel pain immediately, really. No.

Speaker 1: 1:08:14

So your left hand, are you left or right handed?

Speaker 2: 1:08:16

Right handed, was your pistol in your right hand, then obviously it was in my right hand. So dominant hand, yeah, punched out here.

Speaker 1: 1:08:26

So dominant hand, yeah, punched out here oh, you took the round like this around yeah, through this one. Okay, damn, and then it didn't go into your face, or anything?

Speaker 2: 1:08:31

no, but the one I hit here ricocheted up. I don't know where this one went. It's crazy that no one has any answers for any of this shit. It's wild even like um well, I'll get into some of that too. So, like this one takes a round, I don't even know. So here's the thing. I don't know the order of the shots, so maybe if this one went in after the other ones and my hand came up, I don't know. I don't know how it happened, because I can't remember all those little details.

Speaker 1: 1:08:55

Did you have any body cams on or anything?

Speaker 2: 1:08:56

Nope, Back then the marshals did not allow body cams and at some point, probably when this hand got hit, I dropped my firearm. Okay, so when I landed, I landed down on my chest and I landed on my hands. And when I landed on my hands I crushed this one with all my gear. For sure Broke all the bones in here. Yeah, so now both my hands are out of commission, like I can see my gun I can't grab.

Speaker 1: 1:09:28

It Was your gun laying far, or were you? I could reach out?

Speaker 2: 1:09:31

and touch it, but you can't get up. It's just like because my hands, my fingers don't move. Yeah, nothing, nothing, not one finger.

Speaker 1: 1:09:37

So you got a crushed right hand and a bullet in your left went. They ripped through your left hand and the left.

Speaker 2: 1:09:42

The left also crushed because from the bullet I also landed on it too, so I broke everything and you have two bullet wounds wounds in your right arm and one in your left shoulder, shoulder and then I got a bullet sticking out of my chin and then I have one through my right leg all around six feet away yeah while you're laying on the ground.

Speaker 1: 1:10:07

Yeah, what was? Do you remember what was going through your head? Did you think you were dead? At this point, like Like, is he going to walk up and shoot me?

Speaker 2: 1:10:13

I remember every detail of that. Yeah, so I hit the ground and realized my hands don't work.

Speaker 1: 1:10:22

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 1:10:23

And I still I can't see anything because his rear driver's side tire is blocking my view from everything. Okay, kind of like laid out, like where my head's behind his tire but my body's like out in the middle of, like where his, where you would walk to go to his door, like out there out right, so you're exposed. I'm totally exposed, and plus he's like six feet from me. So and my partners were there doing our thing, which I'll get into in a minute. Um, so in my head I'm like, fuck, this guy's gonna take like two steps and just for just end it.

Speaker 1: 1:10:55

You're waiting for him to kill you Pretty much.

Speaker 2: 1:10:58

Yeah, I mean, this is so. I'll get into all this here. It's going to sound like a lot, but yeah, I remember this all happened in like seconds. Yeah, for sure, split second. So my first thought is, yeah, he's going to come back here and finish this. And then, at the same time, I'm thinking about not just life and death, but I'm thinking about my wife, for sure. I'm thinking about my son. I'm thinking about how I might not be seeing them ever again.

Speaker 2: 1:11:29

And at some point there, man, I heard this voice in my head and it was like screaming at me and it was saying you failed, you fucking failed, and now they're gonna pay for it. Who's they? My wife and my son? Yeah, and it was crazy, man. It was like it was like everything kind of went black and I could just see them, like their faces, and it wasn't like sad faces, it was like happy faces, like smiling at me, like hey, we're still making dinner, it's time to come home before we can eat dinner, you know. And then that voice was just pumping away.

Speaker 2: 1:12:12

And the crazy thing is that voice that was fucking with me I believe is part of the reason I survived, because it was that voice that was like, made me realize, like dude, you're not out of the fight yet, like you can still do something. So that's when I was like I got got. I can't just lie here. So I used my left leg and my elbows, I just pushed and crawled and showed myself underneath the back of his car as far as I could in my in hopes to cover most of my vitals.

Speaker 2: 1:12:44

And I thought, well, if he does come back here and try to pump me up, he gets my leg. So that's what I did. I just started crawling around in his car and shoving under there, shoving and shoving and shoving. And as that's all going on, george, who's on the passenger side, sees an opportunity for a shot, takes a shot, strikes the guy in his left side. He runs, he takes off running, runs by me as I'm underneath the car, runs past me, turns to his right and sees Josh, my other partner, starts cranking off rounds at him as he's running.

Speaker 1: 1:13:19

So you're hearing them. I'm hearing all the gunfire. You don't know if it's coming at you or anything.

Speaker 2: 1:13:22

Yeah, so eventually they finished him out in the parking lot, he goes down and then it's just silence. And now I'm like fuck, I got to play possum because I don't know if he just killed both of them and maybe he's coming back here to check on me.

Speaker 1: 1:13:36

So this is wild.

Speaker 2: 1:13:38

Yeah, so it was a moment of silence. The gunfire just went to a low and it was just like crickets man. And then, all of a sudden, I hear Josh yelling my name, um cause I didn't know if I was dead or alive either.

Speaker 1: 1:13:50

So they just see your legs sticking out from underneath the, the, the suspect's car that they just killed.

Speaker 2: 1:13:55

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 1:13:56

Yeah, and you're not moving, nope so so they real quick determine they didn't even talk about it. They just knew Josh was like I'm going back for TJ and George stayed with the guy who died. They stayed with him, he stayed with the body. Josh comes back to me, drags me out, um, turn against my leg, picks me up, carries me back to his car and throws me in the back seat. George is staying in the park lot by himself, as now the hotel is empty. This is a shitty hotel, of course. So the hotel is emptying with people. You just murdered that guy. You guys killed him for no reason.

Speaker 2: 1:14:32

He's just there by himself he's there by himself and he has to be, because if Josh doesn't get me out of there, they don't know if I'm going to make it.

Speaker 1: 1:14:39

How did he put a tourniquet? Did it even? Did it even do anything, cause, I mean, you took it in the pelvis.

Speaker 2: 1:14:43

So I mean, obviously he took it. So yeah, so you couldn't get a tourniquet above it. No, he actually got it on top of the wound. So I don't think it stopped all the bleeding, but it slowed. It Helped okay.

Speaker 1: 1:15:00

Yeah, it helped. So he loads me up in the car. Do you remember him? Sorry, I don't mean to interrupt. Yeah, do you remember him putting the tourniquet on. Oh yeah.

Speaker 2: 1:15:09

I yeah, I heard like shit that that's the only thing I could feel. The only pain I felt was my leg at that point.

Speaker 1: 1:15:13

Do you know as?

Speaker 2: 1:15:14

I started crawling. I could feel the pain.

Speaker 1: 1:15:16

Do you know? You have bullets in your chin and in your arms, I know.

Speaker 2: 1:15:19

I have one in my chin because it's resting like on my teeth and my tongue, so I know I have a bullet. A bullet is resting on your teeth and your it's still there. Yeah, it was not there.

Speaker 1: 1:15:29

So the ricochet went up through Right here. Yeah, did it go through your jaw or did it go in between your lip? It went through my lip and then it was resting on my bottom teeth, so you're feeling this bullet in your face, your boy's putting a tourniquet on your leg.

Speaker 2: 1:15:48

I know I got one through my left hand because there's a hole here and there's a hole here. There's a hole in the top hole. Are you scared? Once Josh got, yeah, I was still scared. I mean, I was in shock too, obviously. So, yeah, I was scared, but not to toot my own horn.

Speaker 2: 1:16:02

I did a pretty good job of keeping my shit together, okay, and so did Josh, because we were training just kicks in after a while, right? So we did a great job at keeping communication with one another on the way to the hospital. Okay, are you in the back seat? Yeah, he laid me down in the back seat. I was scared. I mean, I was telling him to call my wife and tell my wife. I'm sorry, I was telling him all that shit. Did he call? No, he's like I'm not calling your wife. You're going to call her, which I didn't. We'll get into that too. We pull out of the park lot. Josh lives like an over an hour away from this location, so he's not like real familiar with where, the how to get to the hospital and shit.

Speaker 2: 1:16:38

there I am, cause it's by my house. So in our pre-ops you always designate like who's going to be evac, joshua's evac. Um, everyone, regardless of who the evac is, is going to have their phone or GPS in her truck, ready to go with push button to the hospital. Yep, done, gets in the truck, takes out of the park line go pulls out of the park line. This is going right underneath the seat, under the passenger side floorboard okay, never mind.

Speaker 2: 1:17:04

So he didn't have the phone ready. The battery died. No, he did great. He did great. He did a fucking awesome job. He's like fuck, I'm sorry, buddy, I knew I should have done that. No, he did great he did all that.

Speaker 1: 1:17:12

He did a fucking awesome job. He's like fuck, I'm sorry, buddy, I knew I should have done that.

Speaker 2: 1:17:15

Nah, he did great, he did all that. Man Phone rolled off the dashboard underneath the seat. He starts going southbound on the highway and I'm laying in the back seat and he's on the radio, he's calling out shit and then I'm noticing, like you going south. He's like, yeah, I was like you got to go north, dude. So he went like a couple intersections south until I got him redirected. He didn't know, he thought it was that way, he would have gotten it because he was getting communication. But I just, you know, I sped it up so he got redirected. He hooked a terrible U-turn. I say terrible because he was getting it.

Speaker 2: 1:17:50

Obviously it wasn't his fault yeah, you turn yeah, and well, the worst part was like my foot was stuck in between the passenger side door and like the seat, so like I had like every time my boot, my eye moved like my leg, my foot was stuck there, was just pulling on my hip so it was just like there's no give, you know I mean because I wasn't attached his bone was split in half. Are you feeling like the?

Speaker 2: 1:18:12

cross oh every it was just yeah, it was awful, the most excruciating thing I've ever felt in my life Terrible. That was the only I didn't feel pain anywhere else. It was just there. Are you looking? I'm sitting there like this yeah, I'm trying to figure out like, okay, I got a bullet here. Is there a hole here? You can't see it now, but you can see the surgery scar. There was a hole here, so it split this bone in half and there was an exit wound right here.

Speaker 1: 1:18:38

So you're looking through your hand?

Speaker 2: 1:18:40

Yeah, I mean, you can't see through it like in the movies, but you can see the hole in the hole. Okay, so now you're laying there your foot's stuck in a passenger door, yeah, and this hand's crushed and it's got blood everywhere, but I don't know why I'm like. I don't see a bullet hole anywhere. I wasn't realizing it. Crushed because I fell on it? Yeah, Just like. Why won't my hand work? You know what I mean, Because I'm in shock still and you're like just fucking around with this in your mouth the bullet.

Speaker 2: 1:19:05

I'm flicking it with my tongue. And you realize it is a bullet. Uh-, I think I got it around the face. He said yeah, dude you took one in the face.

Speaker 1: 1:19:17

I remember him saying that he's like yeah, dude, you took one in the face. I'm not laughing at it, it's just wild that you're processing this like this is, yeah, it's wild dude.

Speaker 2: 1:19:27

He confirmed all this. He's like yeah, you said this, you said that like to the point where I was in the back seat and this is, I'm a smart ass anyway. Yeah, and you ask cops and military we're all smart asses and joke with each other, don't take anything serious, yeah right.

Speaker 2: 1:19:40

So I'm in the back and, like he had just it was a jeep, uh, cherokee leather seats blacked out. This thing was badass. The marshal service bought it and issued it to him. He just got it, like in october. It was fucking awesome. And, um, I'm in the back seat and I'm spitting blood all over the fucking place. Okay, I remember like apologizing man, I'm really sorry. He's like don't be sorry, dude, you're gonna be fine, we're gonna get you to the hospital. I was like I know, man, but I got blood everywhere. Back here I'm spitting it up and I know how much you love this car. You know what I mean like just fucking around was there a lot.

Speaker 1: 1:20:08

I mean, were you bleeding? I mean obviously anything in the face.

Speaker 2: 1:20:11

I had a lot of blood coming out of my face just because you know you have a lot of nerves and shit there so is your mouth just filling with blood the whole time. I'm just like spitting everywhere like projectile spit, like it's back seat was just red, black turned red, almost yeah. And then my leg.

Speaker 2: 1:20:28

I was losing blood in my leg but, it wasn't ephemeral, but I was still bleeding out, like my leg was swollen up so big my pants were starting to rip. It was that. That's scary, frightening, yeah, and it hurt like nothing I've ever felt. So then he's, we're communicating, getting him, getting him going northbound, and now he's working on like the radio, um, with what's going on, and then getting other units out to the highway to like guide him to the hospital.

Speaker 1: 1:20:56

So cause I can't really tell him like street names and shit, I'm just like you know God you got six bullets in you, yeah, right so, um, rightfully so, I would say, you're probably all right so.

Speaker 2: 1:21:08

I start looking for shit to do. Do you know the way, like I, my hope, my and even before this, my whole thing was like always, look for work, don't make yourself useful, right, don't sit around, do nothing all the fucking time, right? So just like and that was my, my thought, like in the parking lot, was like, make yourself useful, fucking, do something. You'll just lay here and die. So I crawled right. Well, same thing in the back seat.

Speaker 2: 1:21:28

I didn't want to just lie there and like, wait, like what the problem was like, you know, I couldn't fix my tourniquet, I couldn't take my vest off and check for other wounds, I couldn't do shit because my hands don't work. Yeah, um. So I was like, well, I need to slim my heart rate down. I know that because blood loss, right. So I started working on combat breathing, okay, which for me, like it just felt natural because you know, I did marathons, I did ironmans, like I worked out regularly. So, like, working on breathing is something I did all the time. So I just started slowing my breathing patterns in. You know, inhale, exhale, getting that together. I'm trying to slow that heart rate, slow the blood loss. And then I started moving into the next portion Like all right, I got that check. What are we going to do now?

Speaker 1: 1:22:18

Okay, we're going to get to the hospital and you're gonna have to tell them that's what happened. I got there like like yanking on shit, like no, you gotta do this snap and this clip and this velcro because you're wearing not normal police gear. Are you kitted out? I'm kitted out okay.

Speaker 2: 1:22:22

So, yeah, that's pretty much wearing almost the same thing on that cover. Okay, that, that is the vest I was wearing. That's my vest did you get to keep it. Yeah, it's hanging in my office.

Speaker 1: 1:22:29

That's very badass, okay, yeah, so how long from when your boy loaded you to. You got to the hospital. What was the time lapse there's?

Speaker 2: 1:22:36

like a little over eight minutes that's really quick, but that's eternity for you yeah, I got to the hospital and they said I probably had like another 10 to 20 before you bled out.

Speaker 1: 1:22:46

Yeah, so they said, if you would have waited for an ambulance to get there and all that paramedic shit, they'd say you probably made it yeah damn yeah, um so you get to the hospital, yeah, what do you remember feeling like a sigh of relief, like oh fuck, I'm here, or I knew once we got, I was confident.

Speaker 2: 1:23:03

once I got to the hospital, I was gonna live. Okay. My thing was my leg. Um, so and this is in the moment I just started doing it was I told myself that leg was. It was good, trash is gone, I'll just be on the amputee Like they're going to take your leg Right. And the goal of that was I didn't want to wake up. I knew they were going to put me under and I was going to wake up at some point. So my, my thought process was I want to wake up and look down and be surprised I still had it.

Speaker 1: 1:23:31

For sure.

Speaker 2: 1:23:32

Not vice versa.

Speaker 2: 1:23:33

I didn't want to be like fuck, I got a lot off my leg. You know what I mean, yeah, so I'm just like it's gone. Dude, you're going to take it. You'll be an amputee, it's all good. People do it every day. You'll be no different. You'll still do the things. So get to the hospital. Eventually I do wake up my leg's still there, thankfully, obviously. But in that time frame at the hospital they got me there. So this was the first hospital stop. I was there for like 45 minutes to an hour. Just get you stable. Get me stable, intubate me, and they're going to fly me out.

Speaker 2: 1:24:13

While that's going on, notifications have to come right for my wife. So small state, small area, small law enforcement, community, cell phones, social media, right. So we had sold our house and we lived with my in-laws at the time. We had bought some land and we were building a house. We were actually breaking ground late that week, so we lived with my in-laws, which worked out great. My wife was at home with my son and my in-laws reading bedtime stories to my son and she starts getting text messages. Stuff's on Facebook's popping up. People are calling or texting her like are you okay, do you need anything?

Speaker 1: 1:24:53

Da-da-da-da-da-da, so she hasn't even gotten a call from the PD yet. She's just having random people message and call her Yep, and they were confirming it was you the word had gotten out or was it speculation?

Speaker 2: 1:25:06

at this point she didn't know, okay, people knew, but no one had called her yet and said tj, this happened to tj, it came, so she's getting all these messages and she'll tell you about it. Um, she's getting all these messages and she's like what, what's going on, like what's happening. Then finally, one of her friends calls her, whose husband's a cop uh, that I'm good friends with and was like she's like I don't know what you're talking about. She's like you don't know. No one's called you. She's like no, she's like oh, tj got shot, he's in, he's in the hospital and that's a tough one.

Speaker 2: 1:25:41

Um, so she, you know, takes care of my son, puts in bed and then goes downstairs to my father-in-law and was like you got to take me to the hospital right now. Tj got shot and the only information she has because you know it's rumors everywhere, so she got this is it was true, but not true. So the only thing she was told was that I was shot in the face. But if you're not calling, that's the thing. Every op I did, didn't matter how serious or how little it was, she knew when I was going on it and after I was done, the moment I got back to my car, I called her or texted her and she knew that my team of three guys that night had been in a shooting and I had not called or texted.

Speaker 2: 1:26:28

So it's reality setting in for her. She knows something's up. She knows something's up, okay, so father-in-law takes her to the hospital. It's like a 10-minute drive, 12-minute drive, something like that. It's close On the way there. My department calls her. Finally. Now, with that being said, they took a long time, they took a route to get to that point. That was unnecessary. But I will say, say somewhat in their defense, regardless of what they did, they weren't going to beat social media and cell phones with everybody. It just wasn't going to happen. It was that quick, like she knew I was shot, probably within 10 minutes of me being shot. She probably knew before my agency. No, it was that quick, it was that fast. What? Yeah, it was that fast, probably within 10 to 15. It was that fast, probably within 10 to 15 minutes max. She knew.

Speaker 1: 1:27:18

So you're? You probably weren't even close to the hospital yet.

Speaker 2: 1:27:20

I. When she got the call I was probably like Pulling in. I was probably there, I probably had just gotten in there and they were probably taking my shit off.

Speaker 1: 1:27:28

And then how long before the department?

Speaker 2: 1:27:31

called On the way to the hospital. On how long before the department called On the way to the hospital, on her way there, like right before she pulled in there, so they got to her. You're talking 20 minutes 30 minutes yeah probably 20, 30 minutes, probably Probably about a half hour, something like that. Yeah, damn, it took a long time. Okay, we had officer shootings.

Speaker 1: 1:27:51

We never had an officer shot or there had to be a notification. So at the same time, they're figuring out a new protocol, because they're not used to dealing with this Well they should be, but they're probably not.

Speaker 2: 1:27:58

Okay, I will. We'll get into some administration shit later, but the chief there now is not the chief during the time of the shooting. So boom, Okay. So yeah, so she gets to the hospital. She gets there, I'm already out.

Speaker 1: 1:28:14

They got me intubated For sure, so they didn't lifelight you yet out of that hospital they were getting ready to Okay.

Speaker 2: 1:28:19

So she comes in. Like I said, the only thing she's been told by, like friends, through rumor bill, is I got shot in the face, so she walks in. I got this big old bandage on my face. She's like at least he's a nice guy, he doesn't have to look great all the time. You know what I mean? Um, a personality yeah, he's got a personality, it'll be fine.

Speaker 2: 1:28:36

Um so, and then I remember I don't remember, but she was telling me that and I guess, like at one point she was like holding my hand, and then there she was like, oh, you shouldn't hold his hand, he's got a, he's got a, his hands are broke. He got shot in the hand too. And she's like, oh, uh, like what exactly is going on everywhere? You know, know what I mean. So she gets to the hospital and then, you know, another half hour later they fly me up to another hospital, like a little over an hour away, hour 15 minutes away, and then my department drives her up to that hospital. So Thursday night we get up there.

Speaker 2: 1:29:09

The county agency of that county it's just two counties away paid for a hotel to put her up in a hotel that night. My agency didn't pay for it. The other agency put her up in a hotel with a night. So her and one of her friends, whose husband is one of my classmates from the academy he worked for another agency Stayed a night with her. Yeah, wait, you wanted to pause there. Yeah, wait.

Speaker 1: 1:29:37

You just to pause there? Yeah, wait, you just got shot six times Fighting for your life. It gets better and your agency didn't even cover the hotel, to put your wife up at the hospital.

Speaker 2: 1:29:48

Not only that, I was also told later on, by a number of guys that were there when this happened, that one of the chief's first question was who's going to handle this workers'ies? Are the feds handle this, or does the city have to handle this? The feds are going to handle this right, because he's working with bro.

Speaker 1: 1:30:03

I want to like I want to like, like support law enforcement agencies, but you hear so much shit, I don't want to support them.

Speaker 2: 1:30:11

You hear, so much, not the administrations, dude.

Speaker 1: 1:30:14

Yeah, god help the guys that are on the beaten path every day out there.

Speaker 2: 1:30:19

Oh, it gets better with the administration talks. We'll get into that as we go. What yeah?

Speaker 1: 1:30:26

It gets better, okay. So you're Fuck bro, okay.

Speaker 2: 1:30:37

This is mind blowing to me. This is where how, like? Why is that even a question, I don't know, man is it going? I mean I wouldn't. I mean when I heard I wasn't surprised because the guy was just that's, he's an asshole, and I never liked him. He never liked me either, be honest with you. But um, just how he was, I wasn't surprised at all. When I heard that, I was like I'm not surprised, yeah, so, uh, so, anyway, yeah, they put her up in a hotel that night with a friend. The other agency, the other agency puts her up in the hotel for the night with a friend, excuse me, and um, they keep me out, keep me in a bed all night. Um, that's thursday night.

Speaker 2: 1:31:05

Friday comes, I have my first round of surgeries at like two o'clock ish somewhere around there and then that night, friday night, they start bringing me out. I don't remember any of that. I remember seeing like a flash of my wife and a flash of my parents. I didn't know, I thought it was like a dream. But to back up for a second, like the surgeries I had, my initial surgeries were my right femur. I had a rod placed from my hip to my knee. I had. You know, obviously I had this bullet removed, some shrapnel moved down my face and I had, uh, plates and pins in here, that behind my hand here and my my thumb. Here I had a this is fused, so it works here, but the knuckle doesn't bend, so I'm just a okay, all the time, uh, and then this one here, same thing, pins and plates in here behind my thumb, and then that's all the mobility I have there. And then I had some like go on down the road, had some other strangers I had, for sure. I had a couple bullets removed later that we'll talk about if you remind me.

Speaker 2: 1:32:05

So, friday comes, have those rounds of surgeries. Friday night they're bringing me out. I remember seeing like a flash there. And then, december 2020, covid is an issue, right. So, um, no visitors, everybody out, covid protocol, nobody can see them. Get the hell out of the hospital. So I'm in the icu for seven days. Um, I had because it was deemed a security issue because of what had happened. So I had one officer from my agency with me and one member from the martial service with me 24, seven. So I was constantly in company the whole time. Um, and then you had some cops here and they're like sneaking in where they can get through, like to come see me and say hi, but no family could get in at all Lockdown.

Speaker 1: 1:32:52

So how bad did you want your wife at this point?

Speaker 2: 1:32:56

dude, I was stuck with like a facetime call or something once in a while. That's about it.

Speaker 1: 1:33:02

Yeah yeah, dude, I get a cold and I'm the most worthless human being on the planet yeah, I couldn't imagine, dude, I get a man cold and like I just want the same way, dude.

Speaker 2: 1:33:11

Yeah, I could have a headache and I'm like crawling up in a ball. You know what I mean.

Speaker 1: 1:33:15

Yeah, yeah, I. That's why I asked like how horrible was that?

Speaker 2: 1:33:18

and then the other side of it. For her, it's like you know she's dealing with everything at home yeah and you can't see me and know what's going on.

Speaker 2: 1:33:24

I know what you know and like for me in my mind I'm like it's dragging out, because I'm like where's she gonna think when she sees me? What you know? What is she gonna say? What do I say? You know? Um, so during that stretch in the icu which is a week, seven days, um thursday to thursday, so friday, saturday, they take me down in recovery. I'm like really coming out of it now like okay, I know what's going on. I look down down my leg's there. All right, we're good. So Saturday my chief calls. I don't have a phone with me. It was in my car, still in the evidence hat. They brought it to me eventually. So I was like people were calling for me. So the chief calls into whoever the officer was in there with me and I get on my phone with him and I go with him him and he's like hey, buddy, I said, I said it's a big thing.

Speaker 2: 1:34:16

Hey buddy, that's what he always says, Everybody. He's like hey buddy, uh, I'm coming up that way. No, this is like an hour and 20 minutes hour and 15 minutes from my stop in there and see you, and I was like that's really nice of you appreciate that. So so your chief yeah hadn't talked to him. Yes, first, first conversation with him first conversation.

Speaker 1: 1:34:39

If your chief makes time for you after you just got shot six times buddy, he's gonna try to make time to come see you in a hospital.

Speaker 2: 1:34:46

He's gonna pop in and see me, see how I'm doing, yeah fired.

Speaker 1: 1:34:49

Yeah, like that. Those are the types of like get him out of there. I'm sure he's not there anymore, but now he retired. Yeah, like whoa. So what better is going on in this motherfuckers life? Dude to not come see one of his officers that just put his whole line on the lot? Life on the line.

Speaker 2: 1:35:09

Oh dude, I had another lieutenant never even never called me or sending to me. To this day I walked walk time in the hallway. He's like, hey, how you doing Never acknowledged it. True story.

Speaker 1: 1:35:21

I don't understand. Like where is this brotherhood in the law enforcement?

Speaker 2: 1:35:24

community. Oh, dude, that is so. Like the whole Thin Blue Line thing is like I look at it as a fucking myth, dude. Like that is few and far between. That's like, um, people look at that different ways. Like the brotherhood is not like a brotherhood.

Speaker 1: 1:35:38

I feel it's a very small percentage.

Speaker 2: 1:35:41

That actually is like my team of guys with that task force.

Speaker 1: 1:35:45

I would say that's a brotherhood you know, but I feel, in order to get the brotherhood and there's probably a who are like I'm a normal cop and I have a brother, I get every department's different. But if it was like, and I feel, good cops hate bad cops, bad cops hate good cops, but all cops hate each other, it's a lot of the Home Force, is a lot of backs. Everybody turns on each other.

Speaker 2: 1:36:10

Turn on each other quick man. It's an ugly profession. It really is dude. It's not like people think the public that doesn't know anybody. They think, oh, it's just a blue line, bro?

Speaker 1: 1:36:19

no, it ain't dude like. I have a buddy that went from marines to cop and he's like dude, this, this shit sucks yeah, and he'll turn you in so fast, so fast, dude, yeah, but then you hear you're in the military, like yo especially when it comes like promotion time.

Speaker 2: 1:36:31

It's like watch out, watch out, it's promotion time. Yeah, it's crazy man. Yeah, that's a myth, dude, it's a myth.

Speaker 1: 1:36:42

Okay. So you get shot six times, end up in the hospital, are you laying there and like this was not fucking worth it. Did that ever go through your mind, dude so?

Speaker 2: 1:36:56

I'm thinking a lot of shit. I'm very fortunate in a number of ways, but one being when I woke up in the hospital, dude, I just had this sense of like thankfulness. Okay.

Speaker 2: 1:37:10

I wasn't thinking like why me, why does this have to happen? I mean, once in a while that shit would come in. But like why me, why does this have to happen? I mean, once in a while that shit would come in, you hit you, but like I was really good at not letting it get to me, I was just thankful to be alive, man For sure. Um, are you religious man? I mean, I've always had my beliefs, um, a lot more now For sure. I just kind of skipped this part, but we'll jump back real quick, cause the quick one. So in the midst of the shooting, when he turned, when he ran by me and turned to shoot at Josh, josh came up at a holster and when he came up his first round went into his own engine block. Okay, drives me to the hospital. He doesn't know that at the time. Drives me to the hospital. As he's pulling up to the ER door with the brake, engine dies and he just coasts right up there. Engine stayed on the entire time until he got to the ER door.

Speaker 1: 1:38:04

Bro, how are you not a believer at this point?

Speaker 2: 1:38:06

Boom, Exactly. How are you not a believer Telling you man Tell? Me what's going on, and you look at all these rounds that hit hit me like none of them hit it. Like even here you have aries run through here. Yeah, it didn't hit any bone or nothing, just clean through. God man he you dude yeah, nine lives man. I spent them all. I spent them all, dude, yeah, yeah you got six of them right there yeah, uh, so that.

Speaker 2: 1:38:31

So I mean, yeah, I'm a believer dude, for sure I have, I definitely have my beliefs in in that and god for sure, a lot more now. Um, I was never one to like talk to god or pray and stuff. I do that shit all the time. Now, change your life yeah, I really did big time.

Speaker 1: 1:38:45

Um, isn't that crazy. Yeah, just a conversation with god.

Speaker 2: 1:38:48

How much it'll change your life yeah, like I do a lot of rucking I live on the beach, so like I rock on the on the beach. Yeah, I see your videos and like, yeah, I see those videos, I post stuff all the time. Like every time you see one of those videos at some point before or after that video, I'm sitting on the beach talking to God at some point Every time.

Speaker 1: 1:39:04

Every day.

Speaker 2: 1:39:07

It's the healthiest thing you can do. Yeah, I feel like you know what I mean. I don't know, even if I don't really have much to say. It's like hey, man just checking in. I mean just crazy that may sound to some people, it's just the way it is.

Speaker 1: 1:39:17

I mean, I'm curious to us. Um, yeah, well, good, Okay, bro. Yeah, yeah, man, so that is wild. So your lieutenant never even acknowledged it. Yeah, your chief, did he ever find time to come see you? He came in the next day about 20 minutes.

Speaker 2: 1:39:42

Then he left. Yeah, about 20 minutes, which is fine with me. I didn't want to see his ass anyway, because I never liked him.

Speaker 1: 1:39:48

Yeah, for sure I get you.

Speaker 2: 1:39:49

I didn't even want him to come. Yeah, he came left. So there was some talk during this time period. There was a lot of things behind the scenes where, like, people were contacting the governor about getting my wife in to see me. The governor was contacting the hospital, like president and staff, to get me in. They denied it. They're like, no, she's not coming in. Got denied all that even though you know they wouldn't let her in. Even with a call from the governor they wouldn't let her in. So the marshals were like some of the one of the one of the one of the supervisors that I had with the marshals were like, dude, I think we're going to get your wife geared up Like we're going to put her in like a marshal's jacket and we're gonna fucking just bring her in and I was like man, I don't want to cause any problems dude like, and it ended up not having to happen because, like the next day they're like, you're getting released, your wife can come up, so how?

Speaker 1: 1:40:42

okay. So, from coming out of your induced coma and surgeries, yeah to getting released. How? What was that time period?

Speaker 2: 1:40:50

so got there thursday night surgeries.

Speaker 1: 1:40:53

Friday, the following thursday, I'm getting released so you haven't seen your wife in since I left for dinner from dinner 10 days. Seven, how many? Seven, seven, oh, it's okay, so seven, so yeah.

Speaker 2: 1:41:06

So she didn't get to see you, she saw me when I left the hospital, the first hospital the only time she saw me was when I was unconscious. She saw me after. My saw me was when I was unconscious. She saw me after my round of surgeries when I was unconscious still, and then they kicked her out, yeah, so I never saw her.

Speaker 1: 1:41:22

That was rough for you, huh.

Speaker 2: 1:41:25

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 1:41:27

Okay. So seven days later your wife comes walking in. She comes walking in.

Speaker 2: 1:41:31

What'd that feel? Like it was good, it was weird, it was mixed, not like mixed like I didn't like it. Well, so they bring her in. All the guys clear out, they're gone. And she walked in, walked around, came up to the side and the first words out of my mouth were I'm sorry, I failed you.

Speaker 1: 1:41:55

You really felt that way, yep.

Speaker 2: 1:41:58

Yeah, I felt like a failure Because I always said I would come home to you and I almost didn't. Well, I didn't that night, yeah.

Speaker 1: 1:42:09

And what was her reaction to that?

Speaker 2: 1:42:12

Without skipping a beat. She didn't even think about it. You've never failed me. I don't even think I finished a sentence yet and it was like shut up, you never failed me.

Speaker 1: 1:42:24

Was that like a sense of relief on your part?

Speaker 2: 1:42:27

It was massive, dude, not just relief, but just like knowing, like the belief that she had in me. For sure but just like um knowing, like the belief that she had in me for sure, um, and then like that sense of like, all right, you can't let her down now. Like you gotta, you gotta make this, you gotta make the best of this time to fight, yeah, and the validation too, I mean as a man.

Speaker 1: 1:42:46

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 1:42:47

It's the last thing we ever want to do is let our family down and you know like for a little while after that, like I always regretted saying it to her, and then I realized, like one, it helped me. And two, like, regardless of whatever it was, I felt I needed to say, that was it. She needed to hear it because I needed to be honest with her you know, so, like, as time went on, I was like I didn't regret it so much saying it.

Speaker 1: 1:43:20

I hate that I felt that way, but I don't regret saying that to her. You know what I mean. Was it like a? You just felt sorry, like you got. Yeah, I can't put myself in your shoes, but for me I like fuck like I, they got me, you know like I'm sorry, it's not supposed to happen like this yeah, uh, I mean, I felt like I failed because I didn't come home.

Speaker 2: 1:43:30

You know, uh, you know um, I positioned my car in a way I shouldn't have positioned it.

Speaker 1: 1:43:38

Do you really, looking back at it now, do you think that would have even made a difference? Because it sounds like he was ready.

Speaker 2: 1:43:42

Yeah, he was ready. So the way I look at it is I don't Monday morning quarterback it. The way I look at it is I could have done everything textbook and taken one round. That was fatal. All I know is that the way I did it led me here. Yep, you know, and that's that's what matters. You know I survived. That's all I care about, you know.

Speaker 1: 1:44:02

So she comes in, you guys get to talk for the first time, yep, and then you're getting released that same day. It was that day or the next day the following day, the following day, I was getting released. How was that? You pretty met it up at this point.

Speaker 2: 1:44:18

Yeah, I mean, I was pretty met it up that week. I had all kinds of painkillers sure did me and shit. I wasn't feeling any pain at this point.

Speaker 1: 1:44:23

Okay, um, are you just thinking like fuck, this sucks. I mean because you're oh, I mean now you're realizing the holes you have.

Speaker 2: 1:44:33

I mean like even like to get me out of the hospital, like to move me from like the bed I was into the stretcher. They had to, like put me on a hoist, yeah, and move me, no.

Speaker 1: 1:44:40

I couldn't move yeah, I mean because you're full casted at this point, right or no?

Speaker 2: 1:44:44

I didn't have a cast, but, um, the leg was like, um, I mean, I couldn't move it yet. Yeah, there's a shit ton of physical therapy to get moving. There's all the apatry in it. Sure, it's solid and my hands are all bandaged up. I have no energy. Like when I got shot, I was like 175 pounds, 72 pounds, and when I got released from the live-in rehab center which we'll get to in a minute, which was like three weeks later, I was like 142 pounds.

Speaker 1: 1:45:15

I lost all that. So you went from the hospital to a rehab center.

Speaker 2: 1:45:17

Yeah, so um, get released that day, load him up in the ambulance, get to see my son, which was great, um shock for him. Obviously he was seven then. So you know, it was kind of like ghost faced, do you remember it?

Speaker 1: 1:45:33

Yeah, yeah, the ride in the ambulance.

Speaker 2: 1:45:37

I remember that, yeah, yeah, and seeing him in a stretcher.

Speaker 1: 1:45:39

I remember that too. Yeah, that's rough.

Speaker 2: 1:45:43

Yeah, I mean, he was in shock, for sure, you know, he's like never seen me like that and I had long hair at the time because I worked undercover, so my hair is like crazy and shit, yeah, um, and the ambulance ride, man, like it was good for him and me because I got to like relax and talk and tell jokes and he got to see like I'm still dad, you know, I mean because I was right.

Speaker 2: 1:46:04

Um, but the worst part of the ambulance ride was, um, it was like a 45 minute drive to the rehab facility or something like that. And that amp, the ambulance had like two windows on the back, you know there's like square, fucking glass windows, yeah, and they had that long ass procession following us like just red and blue lights, like a whole fucking miles of red, blue lights following us, right, you know? Um, so, so the first thing I thought about, dude, was all those processions like that that I had been in when the person in that ambulance wasn't so fucking lucky man Friends of mine, guys, I didn't know whose fingers I went to a co-worker of mine just all those processions I'd been in where I wasn't as fortunate and that really fucking hit me like a ton of bricks with the survivor's guilt, shit, you know. Oh, okay, um, you know why was I the lucky one, you know so good.

Speaker 1: 1:47:13

survivor's remorse or guilt yeah, so good, survivors remorse or guilt yeah, it's such a fascinating thing. Yeah, cause you go through so such something so traumatic or like. But then it sets in like, why me, or why them and not me, and it's that's a really hard one. It's a hard game to play, man. It's a and I'm not speaking law enforcement side, just veteran side with our organization those are some of the hardest guys to pull them out of. The darkest places are guys with survivor's guilt. Yeah, even guys with zero scars.

Speaker 2: 1:47:45

just should have been them and they take it's it's one of the biggest battles yeah, you know, man, it's like and it's something I still think about, not like in a guilt way. I don't feel guilty about it because there's nothing I could do right, you can only control what you control. Those are your cards that you got dealt. Yeah, man, you feel bad obviously still, but I don't feel guilty For sure Because I can't do anything about that, just like they couldn't do anything about it. You know so you just you know you learn to accept it what it is. I mean, everything comes down to acceptance, initially, right, you have, before you move on from anything, you have to accept what the situation is. You're not getting anywhere you know, and that's one thing.

Speaker 2: 1:48:23

That's another thing I was very thankful for is I feel like I woke up in the hospital with acceptance, like accept it and be happy, you have what you have, absolutely um, and that went away, a big, that went a long ways for me. And and then the back that up with, you know, my wife saying you've never failed me, just to add to that is really what, you know, helped me put that fire in my belly to to get moving. So, dealing with that, get to the hospital. This is again. This is the following Thursday night. So we get there. They wheel me out.

Speaker 2: 1:48:54

It was so quick when they got me out I don't even think I got a chance to say goodbye to my son. It was like boom, they wheeled me out into the hospital, up to my room, and, uh, it was me and my wife and like two or three like administrators from the uh um hospital. They removed me to um physical live in physical therapy. So they're like hey, covid, you know you can't have visitors, but, um, we're gonna make an exception. Your wife can come up as much as she wants between the visiting hours, which are eight to eight, and I was like that's all I need man, you know, I mean like I wouldn't see the guys and shit um, fuck them, but I need to see my wife.

Speaker 2: 1:49:29

I needed my time yeah, you know I mean. So she leaves because it's late at this point. Excuse me me, Um. So she's like I'll be back in the morning at eight o'clock.

Speaker 1: 1:49:39

I'm like okay.

Speaker 2: 1:49:40

So she leaves and I'm in this room, finally by myself, seven days later. This was the first second I have to myself Cause, like even when I was in the ICU, I couldn't do anything. I couldn't go to the bathroom myself, I couldn't do anything. I was always with somebody, somebody, and it was either like quick cat naps or like constant conversation, right. So now it's like all this shit's hitting me. You know like, did you?

Speaker 2: 1:50:02

break down oh yeah, that was a rough night, yeah, yeah, that's fucking terrible, man, might be the worst night of my life. Why, what am I doing here? How did this happen? Why me, um, am I going to be a burden? You know I don't have answers to anything.

Speaker 2: 1:50:18

All I know is what my injuries are. Um, I know that they're giving me a two year recovery, two years before I can even think about trying to run again. Um, my hands are a big question mark because everything's fucking shattered so bad they're like we don't, we can't give you an answer on your hands, like it's just going to be a weight game with with therapy, all right. So I'm thinking about all that shit and then, um 6 am comes and the nurse comes in for like check on me and giving my fucking daily shots and shit. So she comes in in swing door and I remember the light coming in from the hallway and like hitting the door and I was like fuck man. And it made me think of a book that I read six, seven, six or seven years prior to this, that book that I hadn't picked up since, a guy that I hadn't looked at since, you know, and it was the Trident by Jason Redman.

Speaker 2: 1:51:15

Okay, and I hadn't looked at since, you know, and it was the Trident by Jason Redman. Okay, and I won't jump into Jay's story, but most people probably know it, but Jay was a SEAL, severely injured, spent time on Walter Reed and during his time on Walter Reed he came up with his sign on the door, which is basically a sign that he made up. That was like a motivational tool to keep him going, basically, right. So I thought, man, that's a really good fucking idea. Like I'm grasping at straws here, man, I'll do whatever I can, right. So it just dawned on me like, oh, sign on the door, jason Redman read that six years ago. It sounds like a good idea. So my wife comes up at eight. Um, I'm like I need some poster. It just like stick a marker in my cast here and I'll like etch a sketch it on there and shit, you know, I mean yeah, yeah. So, uh, it's on there. I don't know if it's legible, really, but uh, so I made this sign up, uh, put a couple patches on it of mine. I put my old canine patch on it, because that's what I had, and I had my marshall's patch and I signed it the best I could and I put it up on the door and uh see, if I remember it was, uh notice.

Speaker 2: 1:52:14

Notice to all who make entry here you must enter with hardened minds and a strong ethos. I'm not here to get back to where I was. I'm here to be better than I was, and I will surround myself with like-minded people. Do not enter with dejection or disdain, sadness or empathy, anger or fear, or you will be turned away. I've received these injuries doing a job that I love for the people and community that I love, and I received them alongside my brothers who I'll join again soon.

Speaker 1: 1:52:40

You put that sign on the outside of your door.

Speaker 2: 1:52:41

Put it on the outside of my door, damn. And I'd say, within about three minutes I had the president in my room like, who pissed you off? What happened, like what's wrong? And I was like, dude, I've been here for 12 hours, I've talked to one person. Nobody's pissed me off, it's, everything's great. This is just a motivational tool. It's not meant to offend anybody. Blah, blah, blah. He's okay, I understand, that's fine, um, and it was cool man like um had people come down looking at the sign on the door and shit, it's cool man, um. But I put it up there for two reasons, like one being for what it was. It was a fucking warning. I didn't want pity parties, I didn didn't want sad faces. Oh, this poor guy, this poor cop, blah, blah, blah. I wanted people to come to my room with a smile upbeat. I started every morning with music playing on my phone at zero seven I called into my PD to do shift change with the guys, like I was on a fucking mission.

Speaker 2: 1:53:28

I wanted everything to be tempo I mean, I wanted a tempo in that place. I didn't have time for that shit. Um, so did that? Um met with the staff they gave me. I had two physical therapists assigned to me. They gave me like their expectations and I was like, fuck it, here's my expectations. I gave it back, right? Um, they're like our goal was to get you out of here in two weeks on a walker, and if you can get out of here on a walker, we're setting you up for some good success going forward. I'm like well, if you think I can get out of here on a fucking walker, I can get out of here on my two feet For sure, that's my mind.

Speaker 1: 1:54:05

She knows, she knows Like that dude, I'm better than that man. You know what I.

Speaker 2: 1:54:11

We hold ourselves to a higher standard. Every time, every time, man, if you think that of me, you're fucking wrong. This is where I'm at. You know what I mean. So I kept that mindset, man.

Speaker 1: 1:54:20

That's man shit, right there, though. That's man shit, dude, 100% that's man shit.

Speaker 2: 1:54:23

That's pure man.

Speaker 1: 1:54:24

shit, that's pure man shit, and that's what I'm about.

Speaker 2: 1:54:27

I wasn't going to let anything get me, so I came up with a game plan. I wanted a long-term goal. My closest one was walking out of there on my own two feet, but I wanted a long-term goal. My long-term goal was well, you're telling me, two years before I can run again, what's?

Speaker 1: 1:54:40

my bread and butter.

Speaker 2: 1:54:41

I love half marathons. I'm running a half marathon in 12 months. Boom, we're going to do it.

Speaker 1: 1:54:46

So you set a goal to run a half marathon under 12 months, before the one year mark, before your one year mark of being shot Six times.

Speaker 2: 1:54:56

That was my goal. That was my goal and I made that decision that day in rehab. Okay, so long term goals are set. Gotta have a game plan. Gotta have that short term goal set. You gotta have those micro wins, mini wins Right, stack them, man, right, stack them.

Speaker 2: 1:55:13

So that's what I did, man, with my therapist. It was like, okay, we want you to do three repetitions of this? Nah, fuck that, I'm doing five or six. Or you're doing four rounds of this? Nah, I'm doing like eight or nine. You know what I mean One more rep, one more round and eventually, down the road that would lead to one more mile, right? So, hence the. So I had these game plans in place. I followed them. I pushed myself in there every day to the max, to the point where they were like unplugging machines and shit. Like no, you're fucking done, dude, like you can't do it. Doing shit in my room by myself, keeping my hands moving, walking around as much as I could with a walker, because I fall at that early stages Like I had to have a walker, right, yeah, they would come in my room and catch me out of bed.

Speaker 1: 1:55:52

Like you can't get out of bed without a silt in. So I'm like, fuck, I can't, you know, yeah, watch me.

Speaker 2: 1:55:56

Yeah, watch me, man. Uh. So, um, every night after I had dinner I buzzed the nurse's station Like brr, brr, brr, have a nurse come down and take me for a walk every night. Oh, um, I can't do it. So, stuck to that game plan, pushing myself the day. Two weeks roughly two weeks go by. I get out a day early the day they tell me I can leave. That's a little win.

Speaker 1: 1:56:28

It's a little win man Stacking them. That's a victory right Day early.

Speaker 2: 1:56:32

That's cool you can get out a day early. We're going to let you go tomorrow. You got some shrapnel poking out of your face there, a little bullet shrapnel. Before you get released, we're going to drive you to this other hospital for a plastic surgery and they're going to dig it out. They're going to bring you back and then we'll discharge you.

Speaker 2: 1:56:47

Cool, right, so go up there and get this shit dug out of my face, come back down and it's time to leave, right, so I come in. They got this wheelchair in my room, so I'm sitting in my wheelchair. They come in with this walker and she's like oh, you're ready to go? Yep, I'm ready, all right, well, we're going to wheel you down. And no, fuck you. So back and forth for a few minutes because they have their own protocols. Like we have to wheel you out, you can, I'll stay here another week. I'm not going out on a, on a wheelchair or a walker. It's just not happening. I think my wife was kind of like dude, just get out of here. We got to get out of here and I'm like I'm not leaving.

Speaker 1: 1:57:23

She's like I'm ready for you to get home. Sit your ass in that wheelchair.

Speaker 2: 1:57:30

Let's get do it. So kudos to them. They let me do it because it's against their policy, um, and they had somebody behind me with a wheelchair and they had somebody in front of me with a walker. But I was like just don't touch me, right, yeah. So made it down down the hallway, down the elevator, out to my car and I was like that's a fucking win. That's that first long-term goal checkmate. Right, keep it going.

Speaker 2: 1:57:51

So, um, start the trek home. Um, small procession going home, leading us home. And, um, the way home, on the highway we were on there's like a bunch of overpasses and shit, and, um, there was like people lined up on the highway having picnics with their families, with flags and on the overpass. How did that feel? It was cool, man, yeah, um, to see support like that. Yeah, dude, because, especially during that time time period where law enforcement in 2020 was really getting fucking bashed, yeah, that was a big concern.

Speaker 2: 1:58:24

When the shooting initially happened, we had guys sitting guard at my in-law's house in case people found out where I lived. It was a fucking rough time and I didn't have any of those problems. Man, the community rallied around me. It was fucking rough time and I didn't have any of those problems. Man, like the community rallied around me, I mean the community that I worked in, the community where I lived in, where I was shot, like everything just rallied around me, man, and I remember, like on the ride home, we just cried and cried and cried.

Speaker 2: 1:58:46

It became it was like funny because, um, every time we saw an ever pass, it got to the point where, like we started, we would cry but we would laugh at the same time, you know, I mean, so it was like fun, almost in a weird way, um, and then, uh, we finally get home. I got home a day early and so my son wasn't expecting me, so um saw him in the driveway. I remember he came over and jumped in my lap and it hurt like a motherfucker, uh, because he landed right on it. Man, my legs like straight, I can't move it yet you, you know what I?

Speaker 2: 1:59:15

mean, but I didn't care. I didn't care, man. So we get in, get upstairs to my in-law's house and I'm a big bourbon guy. So my father-in-law had a little glass of bourbon poured for me and I was like I'm on all these meds. I was like I had a little sip. It was great. And then I was like get away from me, but it was just great. It was great to get home. It was great to see my parents and my son and my in-laws and just be back home. You know, home Like it was like another check in the box, like another step in the progression.

Speaker 2: 1:59:48

So that was a Thursday and that was a Wednesday night. The next day was Thursday, which was new year's Eve. Um, my wife calls the outpatient uh, live in our outpatient physical therapy. I'm going to go to once to get me in there. Like last new year's Eve you know what I mean there was a physical therapist there that was like I got nothing going on. I'll work tonight. They didn't know who I was or what I was, I just physical therapy started um, so we go there, start physical therapy new year's eve night?

Speaker 2: 2:00:16

um same thing. I met with my physical therapist, who ended up being my physical therapist for nearly two years, and she gave me her expectations. I gave her mine back and I was gonna run a half marathon under 12 months and she's like, okay, um, she's supportive of it, or she was like real quick when she realized like this guy's not fucking around.

Speaker 2: 2:00:34

Um, she was very supportive of it. She was also very conscious of how far I was pushing myself too, like she kept a close eye on me, but it was great, because she felt like I was doing too much. She'd be like you might want to back it down a little bit. Or she felt like I could do more. She like no, you can do more. Do more, that's not enough.

Speaker 2: 2:00:49

Yeah, she was great man, uh, so I give her a lot of credit. So that was. You know, january 1st April comes like spring day. I stroll in there and I had been running on like an anti-gravity treadmill. So it's like, are you familiar with that? So it's like a treadmill and they like zipper you in it like the way you stand in it, oh yeah yeah. So it like gives you like a percentage of your body weight, gives you like a percentage of your body weight. So I started with, like you know, like 5% of my body weight, 10%, 15%. So I was I'd been doing that like gradually getting my leg to move again.

Speaker 2: 2:01:20

Um, so she was like it's not very nice out today you want to go for a run, and I was like. I'm like, yeah, man, let's go outside and I like run. I don't know if you want to call her around, but I I ran, uh like a half block, a quarter block came back and uh, I remember running back to my therapist and just crying man.

Speaker 1: 2:01:44

Really.

Speaker 2: 2:01:45

And I feel like a kid just learning how to ride a bicycle. You know, Um, it was like I fucking did it, Like I'm on, I'm on track.

Speaker 1: 2:01:54

Did you have a point at all where you had like an emotional dump?

Speaker 2: 2:01:59

Do you remember, was it?

Speaker 1: 2:02:00

I feel like I had a few emotional dumps, Was there one when you got home and like got to feel your bed again, or were there? There? Was there any like milestones that it hit you Like your run?

Speaker 2: 2:02:08

I mean, yeah, getting home, especially like that first night, like it was just, like it just felt good to be in my own bed, man, next to my wife, yeah, um, no, my son's upstairs in his room, you know. Um, it's just a sense of normalcy. That was. That was big. Um, we probably cried in bed that night I'm sure I'm not a crying at that time um, rightfully so. Yeah, um, milestones, I mean the running, but to back up the first day of physical therapy, to get there I have to ride by the park of shooting. So, even like to today, I ride by it every day. It's right by my house still. So we ride by it and we're getting close and I'm like, oh god, like I'm starting to have a panic attack. So we ride by it and we're getting close and I'm like, oh God, like I'm starting a panic attack, yeah, and we get by it.

Speaker 2: 2:02:59

and then we come home, drive by it again. I'm like, oh yeah. And then the next day we're getting close to my wife. I was like, pull in the parking lot. And she's like what? I'm like, pull in the parking lot, yeah, you. I'm not thinking about her Like, can you pull in the parking lot? I'm not thinking about that, I'm thinking about this is me. I need to pull in the parking lot. It doesn't affect her, it affects me. That's what we do right.

Speaker 2: 2:03:21

We don't think about others. Yeah, right, yeah, she's us, so pull in the parking lot. She's like okay, so I pull in the parking lot, tell to it. And I didn't say a word. We just sat there and chewed on it and just ate it. Um, because my thing is like that's just not gonna run my life. Man, I face it. This is a problem. And when there's a problem, what do you do? Fucking, correct it, right. And if I try to ignore that thing, what? How's that gonna help me?

Speaker 2: 2:03:52

it's winning owns me right, I don't want that parking lot of fucking blacktop and concrete to own me. Fuck that man. I wanted to own that parking lot, right. I wanted to get to a point where I could pull in that parking lot and not even think about what the hell had happened there, and that's where I'm at. I can go there now, have my coffee, check my email and I email and I do sometimes and like I'm focused on like what I have to do work-wise and I mean I'm thinking about why or what happened there because I really no man, I ride by.

Speaker 2: 2:04:21

I ride by it every multiple times every day, seven days a week. I'm straight by my house, right by all the time. Just another place. I mean I remember like obviously like I got shot there, but I'm like, yeah, whatever, you know, I mean damn, that's wild yeah yeah, so you know you have to do it though.

Speaker 1: 2:04:36

Yeah, man, and then you get that victim mentality Exactly, you become a victim and then you're always worried about it what was me? And then it just, it just eats away at you. Yeah, I didn't want that, no you got it.

Speaker 2: 2:04:52

Agreed with that tactic initially, but it worked for me. Yeah, you know, um, she can touch on it later if she was, but, um, yeah, so to jump back to that, yeah, I did that and just kept doing it regularly, regularly, regularly, um, and like now I don't get there all the time, but like every once in a while I might pop in there if I got time to kill, because there's a coffee place next door, boom, we'll pop in, have my coffee, check some emails, post my social media, shit, whatever, while I'm sitting there, um. And then the first few years um, I went back there on the anniversary the first like three years, like at night around that time.

Speaker 2: 2:05:26

Um, just kind of like a victory lap yeah you know, I mean like, and I would go there and just kind of think about what happened and where I'm at now and what's transpired in that timeframe, like where, where, how I've grown, how I've changed, what I've accomplished, where I failed, maybe you know, um, and just think about that progression, um, and I think that was good for me.

Speaker 1: 2:05:48

Do you ever go back to that spot and look where he died? Yeah, yeah, yeah, uh, yeah, yeah, yeah, uh, I would look at spot where he died. Look at spot where I was laying. Yeah, yeah, how far of a distance was it?

Speaker 2: 2:05:59

how far did he make it from you? Uh, he made it like 70 yards. Oh shit, he took like 10 rounds before he went down was he all like pcp'd up or something, nothing clean toxology report, a little bit of marijuana. What was it? 10 rounds huh 10 rounds went down in the middle of reload. He was reloading taurus nine millimeter. It was purple, don't hold it against me you got shot by a purple gun wasn't pink, camo, it's purple it's even worse.

Speaker 2: 2:06:29

It's even worse, purple dude, oh I always put that in my presentations. I got shot with a purple gun, but it wasn't fucking pink camera.

Speaker 1: 2:06:36

Yeah, At least it was a pink like mossy Oak or some shit Right, exactly, yeah.

Speaker 2: 2:06:40

Yeah, it was purple, though Uh, nine mil yeah.

Speaker 1: 2:06:43

That's a Taurus nine mil purple yeah.

Speaker 2: 2:06:45

It was his girlfriend's gun. Yeah, he took reloading huh, middle reloads, changing mags and he fell out, died right there. Yep, yep. So, uh, yeah, it's like 70 yards, something like that. Um, yeah, man, yeah, I go back there still sometimes what's life been like since?

Speaker 1: 2:07:08

I mean what was the well, I mean night terrors, I mean fuck dude In that time frame, man.

Speaker 2: 2:07:15

So initially when I got home, I was home for like a month or so maybe and I had, from what I remember, like my first bad nightmare that like woke me up in a panic in the middle of the night. Like woke her up.

Speaker 1: 2:07:29

Do you remember the night terrors? Was it that moment or was it a different incident? It was a different incident.

Speaker 2: 2:07:35

I was sitting in like a patrol car, um, like at night, like doing paperwork, and a guy came up to me I couldn't see the face but he had on the same kind of clothing he had and shot me through the windshield or thought he shot me through the window and I slumped over the steering wheel and it just like it was real in my head. Sure, I woke up like in a cold sweat.

Speaker 1: 2:08:02

Isn't it weird how you go through one traumatic incident but then your dreams or your night tears are similar, but you're not reliving that moment, but it's built off of that moment.

Speaker 2: 2:08:10

That was the only one I had for a while.

Speaker 1: 2:08:12

So was it reoccurring the same one. I have different ones.

Speaker 2: 2:08:20

The past few months I started having them again, like recently, yeah, like in the past, like a couple months, like really um, all different instances but all same, ultimate same ending yeah um weird man, I don't know so here's a question for you.

Speaker 1: 2:08:29

After being shot, yeah, like for vets, I mean we have the va and we have all the health care. I mean I don't want to say it's the best, but what does a cop have?

Speaker 2: 2:08:38

like I had nothing. I had nothing offered to me um.

Speaker 2: 2:08:44

So you're out here putting your life on the line, get shot six times and that's it yeah I don't want to say nothing's out there, but there's nothing that was brought to my attention or offered to me. You guys don't have. When you get have Before you go back to duty you have to clear a psych. I didn't go back to duty. I retired medically a year and nine months later I was never offered anything. I went on my own to a counselor, a therapist, about a year and a half later. Yeah, the state sent in a woman to see me in the ICU. She was like 75 years old, of course, no background as a first responder, just like fucking state, fucking counselor or some shit. And I'm like get the fuck out of here. I just got shot two days ago. I don't want to talk to you. Yeah, I mean, you're like 75. What do you know?

Speaker 1: 2:09:29

You never got wet and saw a psych, or you never, nothing, nothing, a psych. Or you never nothing, nothing, nope. So you get shot, sent to rehab. Nothing they're like. Thanks for your service. Yeah, what the fuck would make anybody want to be a cop I don't know dude, I don't know man.

Speaker 2: 2:09:49

Like I said, about a year and a half later, I went to uh a therapist on my own one time. Are you paying out of pocket? Nope, here's the kicker. I called workers' comp. They're like the only one we have. It's a small state. The only one we have in the state that does workers' comp is this guy, and he was in the town that I lived. All right, well, I'll go to him. Makes sense. Go to this guy. Tell him why I'm there. Starts, tell him why I'm there. Starts, give me a little introduction of itself. Over, over, brah. And the first thing out of his mouth is how he doesn't believe in PTSD and it's over diagnosed and did it. Starts talking about Vietnam, vets and shit and I'm like fuck. So they're like I get through my story and it's almost like he's rushing me through it. Mm-hmm, 45 minutes like to the dot. He's like all right, well, thanks for coming in. If you need anything else, let me know. Sounds like you're doing great.

Speaker 2: 2:10:43

You got shot and got zero help afterward. Not for psych stuff, no, not for therapy or nothing, nope.

Speaker 1: 2:10:50

That's fascinating, yep, no suggestions of anything from. And they wonder why cops are killing themselves at a cyclic rate. Yeah, yeah, yeah man, this doesn't make sense to me.

Speaker 2: 2:11:02

So I went to that guy to really turn me off to the whole process severely and then, like just recently, like a couple months ago, I started going to one again on my own, just because I wanted to like burn someone else's ear up besides my wife and friends For sure Because I'm really like. I'm like we're really open in my house with communication we have been since that day.

Speaker 2: 2:11:20

Um, I have close friends. You gotta have a tight circle, man. I have a tight circle that I communicate with um, and I'll continue to do that. But I wanted like an outside, something outside just fresh, to like spew shit too. So I started going to a therapist again, like a month or two ago, two months ago maybe. Um, it's been good. You know, I just go in there and sometimes I don't even talk about that shit, I just talk about day-to-day shit to get it off my chest, just normal shit. You know what I mean? Yeah, um, but yeah, like I had nothing offered to me. No, no resources or shit, man, that blows my mind.

Speaker 2: 2:11:48

Yeah, I just did it my own man, like you know, um, fitness was is like my release, you know, and like, even fitness was is like my release, you know, and like, even then, like going through my recovery, cause I had, I was working towards a goal of running a half marathon, so like I was concentrating on healing physically and getting to that point, you know, and at the time I was thinking about I gotta get back to work. You know what I mean. Like you guys are gonna hold my position on the task force. They're like, yeah, you're, it's when, if you come back, you'll be here. I'm coming back, I'm going back. That was my thought. I'm going back to work. I might be back in six months. That's my. I could get back, I get back. They meted you out. Yeah, it took about a year and nine months. I retired it out about a year and uh, well, it was like the decision was made in like a year and nine months and by the time I actually retired it was almost two years to the day well, I mean.

Speaker 1: 2:12:35

So what was the deciding factor for you to not give? My hands um surgeon wouldn't sign off on me and they can't like find a spot for you, or would you have taken it?

Speaker 2: 2:12:48

nah, I wouldn't take it yeah but it didn't matter, because the surgeon was like I'm not going to sign off on the paper, the doc, the documentation for you to be a cop I'm not signing off on. You can no longer be a cop ever. Once I sign this paper over here, you're done All right.

Speaker 1: 2:13:06

So See, I think that's fucked, you know, I think they should. Yeah, if you have the will and the motivation to stay doing your job that you loved. Like why can't they find something for you? Like I mean, especially you being a senior guy you're in 17, 18 years, in at that point, like they can't find something and in I didn't want anything like that anyway.

Speaker 1: 2:13:28

Yeah, I want to go back to kick the doors again yeah, I don't blame you, um, I would have probably taken anything, though, to work my way back, but yeah, it worked out, especially since you know so.

Speaker 2: 2:13:40

Two other people involved in this decision making One, my wife, who was like I don't want you to go back, but that's who I married, so if you do, I support you. You know, what I mean. Just like she should and she would. What a badass wife dude Fucking badass, yeah. And then my son, who was, you know, seven when it happened and eight nine. He's like I don't want you to go back, yeah, right. Like, so yeah you know like that, what else can you do? You know what I mean.

Speaker 1: 2:14:04

So Time to change some things up, yeah.

Speaker 2: 2:14:16

So, like it was worth it. Do you get full retirement? I get a disability pension. Is it worth it? Yeah, I mean it's worth it. I mean I don't get like annual raises or anything like this, is it? You know what I mean? Um, I mean I would've got more in the long run if I stayed longer probably you. It is what it is. It's not terrible.

Speaker 1: 2:14:33

So knowing everything yeah you know now yeah. Seeing the politics side of things and yours and all of that, after being shot, would you do it again? Not the situation. Would you go and do your whole career again?

Speaker 2: 2:14:49

I mean I want to say yeah, I would. Um, it's hard to say like, basing it on the, the political environment you're in now like knowing what I know I wouldn't go into this political environment and do it now. But, not knowing, as someone who wants to be a cop like I probably would Cause. If I could go back to day one again and do that, do that same path, I would Cause. I loved it.

Speaker 1: 2:15:12

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 2:15:13

Um, I love the job. I mean, there's things about you hate, obviously, job Like any other job, but ultimately, like I loved my job, I loved the guys I worked with. Yeah, I had a great career, man, I was very fortunate. I got to do a lot of cool shit that a lot of guys don't get an opportunity to do. For sure, I met some amazing fucking people, some amazing experiences, um, and even like the aftermath of the shooting, like the shooting happened and it's like you know, I am where I am today because of all that bad shit that happened, you know, being shot, um, losing friends to homicide, losing friends to suicide Like I am who I am, I am, I'm where I am because of all those things, good and bad, right.

Speaker 2: 2:15:53

So, and I like who I am and I like where I'm at and I like my family, you know. So, like I don't have any regrets because all that's that progression of all that has led me to to where I am, you know, and who I'm with, so, yeah, so for me to say like I wouldn't go back and do it now, I feel like that would be foolish because I would change my whole trajectory, you know.

Speaker 1: 2:16:10

Yep, okay, I know we talked about it a little bit, but now that you got a son, would you support him if he came home one day and was like dad, I'm going to be a cop?

Speaker 2: 2:16:20

I mean I would support him, I would try to talk him out of it and I would give him the real deal of what it is. Not that he doesn't know, yeah, but I would really press the importance of trying other things before you get there. But he doesn't want anything to do with that. Uh, I think he has other interests. I think, um, no, he's, he's seen all that. He, you know, he went through all that shit with me.

Speaker 1: 2:16:44

Nope.

Speaker 2: 2:16:45

Um, he's never really showed any interest in law enforcement. Um, he likes planes. Um, maybe a little bit of military in him. Maybe he likes history, which is great, like normal shit. You know, I like that about him. I don't think police work's in the cards for him. But if he came to me and was like no, I made a decision, like I'm 21, like I wouldn't be a cop, all right, well, let's talk about it and let me help you out. For sure I don't want him to do that now, definitely don't want him to do it, but I want him to do what he. He's got to have his own life, he's got to have his own experiences and he's got to do what he wants to do, and that's part of his journey.

Speaker 2: 2:17:24

that's part of his journey yeah you know, that's the way I look at it, yeah wild life man, life man um, I will say, like the one, like one thing I'm really happy happy about it or thankful for is that, through my recovery, I made him part of that, part of that process, right, so, talking about, like, his mental health with it. Like I made him part of my healing process. So, like, when I got out of the hospital you know he was seven, getting ready to turn eight and he helped me around the house, helped me pour coffee, helped me get my leg in and out of bed, he went on runs with me because I was trying to get running a half marathon. He, he did all these things with me. Yeah, I made him part of my healing process, which I think was huge, and helping him, um, recover from it too. You know, um, so, communication, like I said earlier, it's huge in our house. Teamwork is huge in our house. Um, that's one thing. I'm very thankful that we're all three on the same page with that.

Speaker 1: 2:18:17

So for sure. Yeah, makes life a lot easier when everyone's equally yoked and on the same page.

Speaker 2: 2:18:23

Yeah, yeah, so, but yeah, no regrets, no regrets, man, that's what it is. Yeah, yeah I love I'm here with you, man, because of that you know crazy. Yeah, man, so no complaints.

Speaker 1: 2:18:36

Yeah, loved every minute of it well, thank god, there's other other plans for you. Huh yeah, um. So what's life been like now that you're out?

Speaker 2: 2:18:47

um well, life went on. Man, I ran the half marathon. Did you make it in the 12 months? I ran one in 11 months. Two weeks later I ran another one, really, um a couple months after that I did the goggins 4x4x48, 48 miles uh, 18 months. I did a half ironman um, last year I did 30 days of murph. I just try to keep pushing myself as far as I can, man. Yeah, I did it and I just keep going as far as I came with that shit for you, dude, like I said, man, like you know, fitness is that's, that's my mental health, that's my break, that's what I do to keep me balanced. You know, I'm a big, uh, big advocate for that and big advocate for that and first responder world, which I think is severely lacked, unfortunately where do you see the biggest problem in the law enforcement community?

Speaker 2: 2:19:39

In totality. The biggest problem training, budget training, next to that, fitness yeah, training, man Training is shit.

Speaker 1: 2:19:49

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 2:19:49

Every department has some bullshit budget that like, for instance, we have. When was in canine, I had canine budget right for food equipment, training, all that shit right. I wanted to go to a canine school one year. Um, oh, we don't have it in the budget. I'm like what, how do you not have it in the budget? Like I have this, I haven't used anything. Oh well, the chief secretary bought new furniture and they took it out of the canine budget. That's the kind of shit that happens in law enforcement every day. That's not just where I work. That shit happens everywhere, cause I hear stories. That kind of shit happens everywhere, man. That's the problem. Priorities are the problem. You know, I don't know, man, it's it.

Speaker 1: 2:20:37

I don't know, man, it's, it's, I hope, I. I hope to god because you know you see these other big podcast platforms. Yeah, you see, like sean, ryan and joe and not so much shorter but like, especially I'll just use sean right, because he's blown up but like he shines a light on a lot of like, yeah, corruption, political wise and cia and all that shit. Yeah, I hope to God, maybe someday this gets out to like how fucked our cops are.

Speaker 2: 2:21:00

You could bring any cop on this podcast and he's going to tell you some fucked up story that has to do with administration. I don't care where they work, you're right. Some fucking story, you're right, that will blow your mind. I guarantee it. Everywhere Guaranteed.

Speaker 1: 2:21:15

I've, yeah, like every time I hear. So I I mean the messages that I get and I'm sure we'll get so much from this episode. But yeah, I just had one last night and this guy wrote me this paragraph and he was just like, and I was reading it to my wife.

Speaker 2: 2:21:29

Oh, the one I messaged you. I commented on. I sent you a message yesterday. The guy was like fucking psycho talking about wanting to fight you. I commented on. I sent you a message yesterday. The guy was like fucking psycho talking about wanting to fight you.

Speaker 1: 2:21:37

Oh, no, no, no, no, not that guy, yeah, not that guy. No, this guy actually, like he messaged me, like he and he went on about the administrative part of his job and I'm like what? It's just mind blowing and like wow, how do we're? We're I mean law enforcement is supposed to be like the head of everything and they're the most fucked up department out of fucked up.

Speaker 2: 2:22:00

They do not take care of their own in any way, shape or form. You know it's like when you're. It's like when you retire normal medical whatever. When you retire, you're a number.

Speaker 1: 2:22:10

You're gone.

Speaker 2: 2:22:11

Thanks for your service. See boom, oh, you have the walkout and clap, and here's your retirement creds. Oh that, that, that gone. See you later.

Speaker 1: 2:22:20

Never heard from again. Have a good life.

Speaker 2: 2:22:21

Yep, it's wild man. It's wild, yeah, like my, my old department. Um, I still talk to a lot of younger guys Now it's like half, more than half the department is like newer guys I don't even know, um, so I so I still talk to some of the older guys there but, um, they're like they have a new chief there. Um, and I they moved into a new building after I retired so it's like everyone's like oh, you, I don't want to combine visit. Like I got to walk into the lobby People I don't fucking know at work, into the desk at chief I don't know, like it's not the same.

Speaker 1: 2:22:57

And I mean like.

Speaker 2: 2:22:58

You know what I mean. I'm just a number and I'm gone. You know, I've been in there a couple of times and I still feel like I don't feel welcomed, really. You know what I?

Speaker 1: 2:23:06

mean.

Speaker 2: 2:23:19

Not that people, just not me anymore. Man, I love, I love a lot of the guys that are still there. But, um, are you cool, the two, two guys that were with you that night? Oh yeah, you guys stay pretty tight. Yeah, we stay tight. We've been on vacations together. Um, I, I speak, I speak all over, but I speak at all the academies uh, not all the academies in delaware, but like delaware state police academy, I speak at every one of their classes since shooting and they go with me and share their side of the story, which is great because I speak. I'm fortunate. I get to travel and speak all over the place and when I'm home and I do the academy settings like, they get to speak with me. So it's a lot of fun to do it with them.

Speaker 1: 2:23:44

Oh, okay, so the three of you kind of tag team it.

Speaker 2: 2:23:47

Yeah, tag team it for the academy Were you used as an example.

Speaker 1: 2:23:59

Um, do they break your scenario down in? You know, because you, when you go through certain courses, like I've been through debrief like a debrief, but like, hey, this is this is where the mistakes were made, this is where mistakes were or where this is where actions that took over were really good have you ever seen that side. Yeah, there was a there was a.

Speaker 2: 2:24:10

There was a meeting. There was a meeting.

Speaker 2: 2:24:12

There wasn't like a there was a meeting held, okay, um, where someone in the office, um, in this closed meeting we had, uh, just felt that we made the wrong decision by doing it. And this is like a few months after having like in front of my face and I just lost my shit, like were you fucking there? Did they try to pin you for anything? Oh, you guys should have waited. You should have done this Monday morning cornerback From a guy who's never done anything remotely close to being on patrol. He's been in the fucking office his entire career. Every time he's been a Monday morning quarterback. My decisions Go get fucked, dude get out of here?

Speaker 1: 2:24:53

Did you have to deal with internal affairs or anything? Was there an investigation?

Speaker 2: 2:24:56

Oh, eternal affairs was easy because I did everything right. I had to be, I mean, I was a suspect in a homicide at that point, so I had to be interviewed by homicide as a suspect.

Speaker 1: 2:25:05

Mm-hmm.

Speaker 2: 2:25:05

Because that a weird feeling, oh yeah, do you? Guys. Get a lawyer, you fucking Miranda right to read to you. Really, were you still in the hospital, or what did they let?

Speaker 2: 2:25:12

you recover they came and saw me in the hospital not to question me. They're like, hey, and a lot like one of the guys on the homicide investigation unit from DSP was like one of my classmates, he's a friend of mine, okay. So they came in and saw me and they're like hey, we're not here for any of that, we just want to see how you're doing and let you know, because you're probably thinking about it. Yes, we, it doesn't have to be now, it doesn't have to be tomorrow, it can be six months from now, when you're ready. There's no rush.

Speaker 1: 2:25:36

So they were cool, that's cool.

Speaker 2: 2:25:37

And then when I got home, it was like a week or two later, I was like let's get this shit done with. I mean. So I went and set up a meeting or interview to be interviewed and took my lawyer. It took like an hour or two or whatever. Is it weird? It's weird, it's very scary, Even though, like you know you're going to be fine Still, Still, Like you're listed on the paper as a suspect and the crime is homicide.

Speaker 1: 2:26:04

It's weird. Did you get to keep any of the bullets that they pulled out of you? Two of them right here. Shut up, yeah, let me see no shit.

Speaker 2: 2:26:18

So you see, the one that's mushroomed, that's from my femur, the top of here. Yeah, that's from my femur, bob, that one that's like perfect. So here's the thing. So the one that's mushroomed is from my femur. So the story about the one from that one is I had an exit wound on the back, that one. So it came in here. I had an exit wound like just below my butt, cheek, okay, okay. So like, oh, it went through and through. Cool, get home from the hospital. I'm home, Home for like a week or two.

Speaker 2: 2:26:53

I'm standing in front of the learning how to walk and I got a hernia. Fuck, I go to the doctor. She's like that's not a hernia, you got some kind of foreign object in there and I was like dude, no way bullet. So that the exit, the exit wound on the back of my leg was bone frapping. I said shot out part of my femur, shot out the back of my. They never found this. Well, it was lodged. I went back and looked at the original x-rays. You could see it in my abdomen. Yeah, they never got it.

Speaker 2: 2:27:18

And what about this one? So that one, I call that the magic bullet, dude. So I asked the doctor. I was like, how did that happen? He's like, I don't know, I wasn't there. It's a good answer. So one of the rounds, like under my armpit, okay, like and down, it traveled down my bicep and lodged in my elbow. So the thing is, you're a bad guy, I'm here and I'm moving this way, so how'd it come in there right? So the thought is probably when my leg got hit, I must've spun, and as I spun, it came in from behind. Someone else was like came in from behind. Someone else was like well, maybe he shot you when he ran by you. Well, one, I was under the car and two, if he would have shot me when he ran by me, it would have went through my arm, not perfectly down my bicep. My arm had to be extended right and it didn't come from my partners, because one was there and one was there. So the theory is, at some point when I got hit, I some point.

Speaker 1: 2:28:17

When I got hit, I spun around and caught one coming in directly behind me. I'm not gonna lie, this is fucking badass. Yeah, so that one got dug out of my elbow. You get the. What about the one that was in your face?

Speaker 2: 2:28:22

you didn't get to keep now that one's an evidence. I wanted to get that one back. I never asked for it, you should. I was asking for everything. I'd say still have it. But um, yeah, so, um, that's insane, yeah, dude, so that one dug out my that one dug out my femur, or out of my abdomen, right here, actually my body was pushing it out.

Speaker 2: 2:28:39

It started to bulge and then I still have some shrapnel in here. I plucked a piece out a month ago, a little tiny piece of bullet fragment plucked out, and I still have stuff in there. You can feel it. It hurts sometimes a little bit. When I lay on my right side I could feel it. Um, it's a little uncomfortable, but you get used to it. Yeah, um, yeah, damn dude. So so, yeah, so the bullets. So once I had to get them taken out, um, I got it all scheduled, went into surgery and the surgeon came in who did all my shit and I was like hey, dude, when get them out, can you keep them for me? And he was like I'm not supposed to give you things back, I take out of you. Plus, it's evidence. Like I got to give it to the state police.

Speaker 2: 2:29:23

And I was like bro, this was like a few months ago, the guy's dead, like there's no trial, they don't even know I'm here. Right, it's all good, just give me the bullets. He was like I'll tell you what when you come in for your follow-up in a couple weeks, I'll have them, for you don't tell the nurses. I was like, okay, sure enough, I'll go back in two weeks. He got in a plastic bag, put on, put it right on his desk. Boom, here you go. I was like you're the fucking man, dude. And like a week later I took it to a local jeweler and was like do something cool with us.

Speaker 1: 2:29:51

She was like all right, dude, yeah all right, that's okay that's pretty cool, yeah, at least you got a cool souvenir, yeah, man yeah, yeah.

Speaker 2: 2:29:59

So I got, I got, I got, I got that, I got my vest, I got my, I got my weapon back.

Speaker 1: 2:30:04

I got all that shit back yeah good gun belt got all that shit, yeah, and they're like you want it.

Speaker 2: 2:30:09

I was like yeah, I want it, man, I want it. It's part of history now, would you not? Yeah, why not? Oh, yeah if you go. Actually, if you watch some of my Instagram videos, like at my desk, you'll see it behind me. Sometimes my vest is right there. Sometimes you'll see it on there, yeah, so there it is, oh shit man yeah, you were one lucky dude.

Speaker 2: 2:30:31

Yeah, man, to say the least. But you know, I just enjoy life, man. I enjoy traveling and speaking and I do some online coaching with Mindset and stuff. I like doing that stuff. We just started a home defense consulting company that we're just getting rolling out, so that's going to be a lot of fun, I think. Yeah, man, just try to do some different stuff, think outside the box a little bit. Yeah.

Speaker 1: 2:30:54

You got a hell of a mindset dude. It's pretty awesome.

Speaker 2: 2:30:56

I appreciate it, man.

Speaker 1: 2:31:02

I've dealt with a lot of a lot, even with our um, our organization, with. We have a law enforcement program in it that helps get officers training. Yeah, and it's our project, blue lion, and um man mindset's everything. It's everything, dude.

Speaker 2: 2:31:12

Everything, everything and, like I said before, man, like it all comes down to acceptance. Dude, if you can't accept whatever it is you're dealing with, you're not going to be able to move on with any purpose man.

Speaker 1: 2:31:25

And you like the guy that you brought up to the you know the Facebook or the Instagram comment, but you saying that it this is where I feel we are doing a disservice to the law enforcement veteran community is these, and I have an organization man. We're over 11 years old now, you know, and I have we've done incredible things, yeah, but the problem is a lot of these cops and a lot of athletes, a lot of veterans. We peak in those careers, we peak in college, we peak in our military career and then we get out and all of these vets I'm just not speaking for everybody, but a huge chunk of them that's where their mindset is and it never leaves that place. So then when they get out, now it's I'm a disabled veteran, I gotta go to the va all the time and woe is me, woe is me.

Speaker 1: 2:32:23

And then, with these charities, what we're I'm seeing and kind of feel like is that now a lot of these charities are almost enabling these vets and it's like, hey, buddy, oh, you're struggling again. Okay, come on, right. No, nobody's focused on changing the fucking mindset of these veterans or law enforcement or anybody like, I don't care if you did 20 years in a career like right, that's your identity. I think what we have to do now as a society and really start shifting gears, changing the mindset, and I'm not talking like some david goggins, oh you're a bitch.

Speaker 1: 2:32:57

You don't get up before and run like not, that's not for me, yeah, not my thing yeah but, man, I'm gonna really focus on being a better father, right, I'm gonna focus on him being irritable and I want to focus in more quality time with my wife and spending and communicating and building our relationship right. But instead we're we're like stuck in this. Woe is me. Yeah, I'm a disabled veteran. I'm disgruntled. That's all you're ever gonna fucking be.

Speaker 1: 2:33:28

And it's like when it's cool, dude, you served your country. First responders, veteran, whatever. In the military, yeah, dude, awesome. Yeah, I commend anybody that wants to give back to in it in any way nurses, doc, whatever. Yeah, but when that job is done, yeah, like, where are we evolving to? But I feel like in these communities nobody's evolving, it's just we're stuck there, we're stuck being a number, we're stuck being a statistic. Oh, 22 vets a day are killing themselves. If this has been going on for the last 20 years, what the fuck is going like? What do we do different? Obviously, something's not working, nothing's. I just saw the other day like five cops in texas killed themselves. Yeah, man, like what the fuck is going on? It's wild right resources.

Speaker 2: 2:34:13

Sometimes you know people don't want to talk. I know speaking I can't speak for military, but like law enforcement, like guys are afraid to say shit because they don't want to lose their jobs over it, exactly I mean then you're, then you're labeled, you're labeled, you're, you're a hazard, you're a liability.

Speaker 1: 2:34:26

Then something happens, is on the pd and you're out, then you're, then you're, you're, then everybody, you see it, seeing everybody's kind of turning away, you're not getting getting.

Speaker 2: 2:34:33

I know guys that have started that process. Man, and first thing that happens when they put the paperwork in oh we got to go to this house, get his car, his ID and his gun, boom gone. You just strip them Like right then and there, their entire identity, that they've had their entire life, whole life, 20 years, 30 years, whatever it is.

Speaker 1: 2:34:56

All because body and it's like, oh, all your shit's going. And what blows my mind about the law enforcement? You take us as military. We do, we do these workups, we deploy and come home. The cops are in this shit every single day, 24, 7, 365 days over the years, 20 years you're on yeah you're on every time you put that uniform on when you walk out and you say goodbye to your wife. Say goodbye to your son yeah you're on.

Speaker 1: 2:35:19

But then the second you're like yo dude, I'm struggling, like yeah, I just had to zip up a little kid in a body bag.

Speaker 2: 2:35:24

Boom, you're labeled yeah, not only are you on, but you're on when you're off duty, because most cops you're working you live in live in or near where they work.

Speaker 1: 2:35:33

you got shot 10 minutes minutes from your house. Yeah. Now you're at a restaurant and you've got to fucking look over your shoulder, yeah.

Speaker 2: 2:35:39

Dude, a month ago I went into a store to find myself a new winter coat. Walk in first guy I see guy put in jail for drugs.

Speaker 1: 2:35:47

And they expect us to like just, and they wonder, oh, just killing themselves and depression, you can't say anything, because then you're labeled, labeled man.

Speaker 2: 2:35:55

Yep, especially in a profession like that. You're, like, you're, you're, you're big time labeled, your mark, I never saw it coming.

Speaker 1: 2:36:00

Never saw it coming because he couldn't say anything.

Speaker 2: 2:36:02

Yep, so he goes home and buries it in a fucking bottle, and that's the other thing, man like oh, I never, the whole like I never saw it coming thing. Like you know, I had a shift mate, uh, who took his life, and everyone was like I never, never saw it coming. And I'm like, yeah, you did, we all did, I me too I'm not excluding myself in that, you know, I saw it coming, I just didn't. I, you know not say you saw it coming. But you're like you knew something was off, yeah, and you're like, fine, he'll get it out, yeah, it's just, it's the way it is, man, you know what I mean.

Speaker 2: 2:36:38

Yeah, but I feel like that. I feel like most of the time that's the case. People did see it, probably, but no one wants to acknowledge that they saw it. I feel like for me because for me that's what it was, my saying is like that for everybody, but I feel like it's like that more than often. I feel like people just don't want to admit that they had a sense of something because of the guilt, for sure it's easy to say I never, never would expect that guy to do it, I had a sense of something I'll tell you right now.

Speaker 2: 2:36:59

I get, I regret it every day, not saying anything, but you know nothing I can do about you know. You know, um, but I feel like that's overlooked a lot. I think guys don't want to own up to that. You know, nobody wants to say anything. It's not my business, I don't want to get involved, um, you know, I don't know man, it's sad, it's terrible. I don't really have an answer for any of it. It's just I feel like that whole situation is just mass chaos, like, but nobody has an answer for it. Yeah, nobody knows which way to go with it.

Speaker 1: 2:37:26

You're doing a shitty job for shitty pay, yeah, and you can't say anything about it, then you're labeled yep and then you're, you're shadowed and you're cut, you're kind of forced out. Yeah, man, um, you're damned if you do, you're damned if you don't yeah, and then that forced out, and then what happens?

Speaker 2: 2:37:41

then transition and then your home sucks because your identity is gone and you don't know what to do. Like for me, I speak from from my own personal experience, and the guy did. I was caught for 19 years, 21, started the academy, retired medically when I was 40, 40, your whole life, my life get out and I'm like now, what? Now? What am I gonna do? Um, not a cop anymore, what? Am I gonna do now. I don't know anything else, you know?

Speaker 1: 2:38:05

I mean, that's fucking scary, see, and that's where that's the point where we need to start focusing on us now. What yeah not.

Speaker 1: 2:38:13

Oh, hey, you're disabled, or hey, you just like thanks for your service, we're gonna send you on a trip, or we're gonna do this for you. We're customized it. Now what? Okay, cool dude like, let's, let's start lining up goals, let's start lining up potential jobs or starting a business, or where do you lack in your life? Where do you struggle? Where? What can we make better? Like that's those. That's at the point where I feel we're missing. So we're missing so much because now it's just focused on the past and their disabilities or what you've been through. Yeah, cool, we've. We've been talking about this for 20 fucking years, yeah yeah we're in afghan for 20 years and nothing's been done.

Speaker 1: 2:38:49

Nothing's changed. Cool dude, thanks for your service. I appreciate all the deployments you did. I appreciate all the sacrifices you made for this country. Cool, that job's done. Now what? Now what? And there's nothing wrong with it. Hang your placards, fly your fucking flag, be prideful of what you did to serve your country, no matter what. Yeah, what's next? And I feel a lot of people get into that groove and that's their identity. It's the. It's the varsity football quarterback wearing his letterman jacket 20 years later. That's that, to me, is what the veteran community at least veteran community that's what a lot of these guys are.

Speaker 2: 2:39:31

It's like that's the thing, man, like when you get out of the military, you get out of like the first responder world, like that's really where the grind starts. Man, yeah, that's really where the grind fucking starts. Yeah, because now you're like similar. It's like you're starting over.

Speaker 1: 2:39:43

You are starting over but then we're told, oh, it's so hard, it's. So I mean, this is another thing that kind of bugs me about when you guys get out yeah, it's like oh, dude civilians couldn't cut it and civilians couldn't ever do it. The military is like bro, you're struggling and living in a civilian world.

Speaker 2: 2:39:57

Yeah, exactly.

Speaker 1: 2:39:59

If civilians are so weak, why are you fucking struggling? Yeah, why is your marriage falling apart? Why don't you have a relationship with your kids? If it's so easy, civilians could do it. Yeah, you know, we knock on that. It's because the mindset yeah, these guys. It's because the mindset like these guys are so focused like, oh, I'm such a hard motherfucker, I did all these deployments Afghan, iraq, blah, blah, blah. Cool dude, that was your job. Right, it's not who you are, not who you are anymore.

Speaker 1: 2:40:22

Not who you are anymore. It's cool yeah, there's nothing wrong with it, but I think we're constantly talking about it. We're constantly living in that moment. Cool, that's how you vent and you can clear things, but how do we move forward?

Speaker 2: 2:40:35

Yeah, it's tough man. Like I always tell guys now the younger guys, like what other interest do you have? Find it, find it, start a side hustle, find some interest Side hustle, or start learning something that you have interest in. That way, when the time comes, you know what you're going to do. You know, I didn't know how many years I'm willing to do it. Oh, I'm having fun. Da, da, da, da, da.

Speaker 2: 2:40:53

And like when I got shot I was in my latter years man, you know, like I should have had a game plan I didn't have shit, you know, and it was like and then two years, nearly two years of recovery and it was like yo, you're not going back, um.

Speaker 2: 2:41:17

So then that's when I started doing why I was doing public speaking during my recovery, just like doing for free because I was on workers comp, yeah, um, and then I started getting into more I was doing for free, um, so that was, and um. So then I started getting into some conferences and doing speaking at conferences, and I still do that. I'm trying to build that as I go. But, um, you know, I'm adding in some other things. Like you know, I'm defense consulting, I'm adding that in.

Speaker 2: 2:41:37

We started a nonprofit during my recovery, the Fit for Duty Foundation, where we sponsor police officers in like crossfit or functional fitness to get them going like in a healthy path right, To get them started on their journey to a healthy mindset, healthy body. So we enjoy that. We have that going and just trying to find new things to do. Man, I'll start the box thinking you know, I've been locked in that law enforcement first first responder world for fucking 20 years. I just kind of want to be my own boss for a while. You know what I mean? It's fun, yeah, Cause now it's like going back to the whole family thing, Like I get to schedule what I want to do when I want to do it. You know, like coming out here flying across the country to come on your podcast, Bring my wife and my son with me, dude.

Speaker 1: 2:42:16

I'm very grateful you came out.

Speaker 2: 2:42:17

It's a great. It's a family trip. You know. Come out here, spend time with you, meet your family, like it's awesome man Meeting new people, new experiences, trying new things, and my son gets to see all that Like. For me that's great you know, I love it, man, so I love where I'm at. I'm not happy about what happened, but in a weird way, like I kinda am, because life man as far as we were dealt.

Speaker 2: 2:42:39

Yeah, man, you know, it is what it is, you know, um, I wouldn't change anything, dude, I love everything about my life. You know, I have my struggles sometimes, like everyone else. I'm no different human. You know I'm human. Yeah, I have things I have better at too, all the time. You know, that's part of life. Um, adversity, man, you know. But no complaints, dude, I love my life. I love everything about it. Um, my wife and I have the best relationship we've ever had since then, you know, um, yeah, man, I just love it. I just love it, man, I just went.

Speaker 2: 2:43:09

My whole thing is I want guys to start thinking outside the box a little more and focus. Even the guys who are on the job, like you're staying on a job, fine, but like you need to reevaluate your priorities. Like, because guys get sucked into that job man looks like me, like, oh, it becomes their identity. Yeah, well, it's like the night I got shot. It's like I got home for dinner, finally, one night and it's like, oh, I'm going back out, do surveillance real quick. Oh, I'm gonna go back out and get this guy. I'll be home in an hour or two you know, you just do it.

Speaker 2: 2:43:34

You know, um, I'm looking back, I'm like, would I change that? I don't know, but definitely going forward I'm changing that kind of that kind of lifestyle, you know. So, yeah, man, that's it, that's it for me cool man.

Speaker 1: 2:43:48

I appreciate you coming out here and sharing your story.

Speaker 2: 2:43:51

Yeah, I appreciate you having me dude. It's been awesome. I had a great time.

Speaker 1: 2:43:53

Yeah, this is this was great, I love it.

Speaker 2: 2:43:57

It's wild. Yeah, man, shit takes you. Uh, life will take you in some crazy places, if you let it. If you let it, yep, if you let it, that's right.

Speaker 1: 2:44:05

Enjoy the ride, man good and the bad, you gotta enjoy it. That's how we live our life, man. We just buckle up and enjoy the ride man, enjoy it, love it. It's a great country. There's a million things to do and yep, many things to see and experience, and you just gotta, you just gotta go do it. Yep, I agree, man well cool man.

Speaker 2: 2:44:22

Thanks, you have me on, brother, I appreciate you bro, I was so glad.

Speaker 1: 2:44:24

Yeah, by the way, we're sending you home with a loaf I didn't know if I pitched the sour bee from the kids, but my son will eat that in the room before we get to the house we're gonna send you some. We're going to send you a chocolate loaf that has Nutella in it and then we'll send you the pizza. One Pizza, one dude, I like it. I think, you could say it slaps Is that what you say?

Speaker 2: 2:44:43

No, no. What do you say? I don't, no, you don't say that.

Speaker 1: 2:44:50

I don't say that that's cool man. He's like, he's like mom. Stop embarrassing me. No, you're not being cool man, you're not cool, mom god thanks, dude, I appreciate your time, man appreciate it, man thank you, thank you that was great.

Speaker 2: 2:45:05

Yeah, awesome dude ciao.