HEADING
The following is true as nearly as I can remember it, with perhaps a few embellishments.
Los Angeles is a glorious concoction of the rich, the famous, the almost rich, the never will be famous and then a full flock of seriously crazy sons-of-bitches.
When I visit, which is too often, I stay with family and enjoy the use of their shower and spare car. Plus I like them all a great deal. This particular morning I was up early, having finished my morning chores, and as I opened my bedroom door my son was coming in the other side. “Check it out, there are 50 cops outside, a full SWAT Team, a SWAT vehicle, and a mobile command post. You know one of those big bus things”.
I live in the mountains of North Carolina, but I’m certainly not a ‘rube’. I was born and raised in NYC and later in LA itself. These things were not as frightening as they were interesting, and I must admit a bit exciting. We walked through the front door and his description was pretty spot on. The street was closed off on both ends and the assembled scientists and flat foots, some of LA’s finest, were indeed milling around like junkies in a whore house.
In the shortened version the story goes something like this.
Somewhere about 4.30 that morning, a group of four meth heads decided to rob a house on the block, some three houses north and across the street from my son and daughter-in-laws home. These meth heads not only tried to rob the place but for good measure they decided it would be cool to torch it as well.
This they did, but being stoners they forgot that even that early in the a.m. fires bring firefighters, police, and other agencies which these idiots want nothing to do with.
Luckily for the good guys, a neighbor saw the flames, called the LAFD, who along with several LAPD squad cars arrived shortly after the call was received. Now seeing this, three of the four men decide to escape. They hop into a green van and leave. However, and this is the good part, they go quite slowly and are pulled to stop on the corner. It seems one of these knuckleheads has dropped his sunglasses and he just couldn’t go on without them. The cops make short work of all three.
So we now have, three down, one to go. The fourth jerk is still inside the house and this point the police are not sure he doesn’t have someone in there as a hostage. On the bull horn they go and receive only curses and threats, but no mention of a hostage, so they safely assume he doesn’t have one.
They offer this mutt safe passage out of the house, and into a waiting cruiser. No answer, just angry screams from inside. The police wait. And they wait. At this point SWAT gears up and they are ready to breach.
Before they can give the order to enter, a madman flies out of the house armed with a good sized knife and attempts to attack the SWAT unit.
Understand these guys are well trained and probably by now, pissed off at this jerk. He charges them, they hold their ground and fire their weapons.
Four highly skilled and well trained SWAT officers do not miss at close range.
That is the short version.
It is now 6.30 am and the neighborhood is awakened by the turmoil. One neighbor approaches one of the gold shield detectives and offers a full video of the events caught on his Ring doorbell cam, complete with the break-in and the resulting scuffles which follow. Gladly accepted. A second neighbor who attempts to walk his dog is granted a police escort, because at this time the entire situation is fluid and nothing has been figured out as to ‘who is who.’
Jump ahead to 7.15 and I am outside enthralled by all this. After all, in the mountains of western North Carolina a brown bear overturning a garbage can and walking down the street with a half eaten fish in her mouth is big news.
My son and his family now step out and informs the officer closest to him that both he and his wife need to go to work and the children need to go to school, so would the cops simply move their cars, trucks and wagons out of the way so they can get going. The cop, a young guy with a serious pair of sun glasses,, says “Can’t do that. The street is closed. No one driving in or out. Why don’t you walk to the corner and call an Uber.” Don’t you love Los Angeles in 2024!
Later that morning/early afternoon, my wife, my young grandson and I walk to our favorite close-by Burrito place since we can’t drive to our real fav. On the way a news crew jumps us and starts asking questions about what happened and how the police responded and how they over-reacted. I use the same “ I’m from NC and my grandson who is carrying his favorite robot is sticking it into the camera and growling like any good robot would. Needless to say we did not make the 5 o’clock news.
The next day I am home alone when I hear the door bell ring and I look out to see an Amazon truck in front of the house. Thinking its a package too large to just leave, I open the door to find a uniformed police officer standing there.
“I am guessing you are not the Amazon guy’, I say… He says “not quite” Then he goes on to tell me the police are doing follow up to make sure the neighbors know what happened and if they have questions or if the need any help.
I explain that by this time some 30 hours later the entire street has talked it over and we all are good. He smiles and leaves,
Looking back the LAPD who often and deservedly so get a bad rap, in this instance did a fully professional and courteous job.
Everyone, regardless of who you may be voting for, for President seemed Ok with the out come.
Not sure what the local meth heads thought about loosing a few of their own, or if there were any Quakers who might have objected to the gun violence, but for the rest of us we all slept well with our windows wide open in this summer heat
