It was an all nighter.
04/24/2007
2 hours sleep, 17 hours at the office and a bunch of bad guys to chase down.
I was checking the pager before I started to settle down on Sunday night. There was a major incident happening. I called the boss to ask if she wanted me to come in. She told me to stand by, but not come in unless I was paged.
I was feeling a little out of the loop, reading the news over the weekend I found out there was a bunch of activity in my unit and I hadn’t been called back in. I was wondering if I was out of graces for some reason. I shrugged it off, figured I would deal with it on Monday morning and got settled down for the night.
The pager bleeped just before midnight. I called back in and was surprised that I got one of my other Sergeants when I called. He asked me if I had been called back on any of the weekends activates, I told him no, I spoke to Sergeant and she told me to wait for a page, she would notify me if she needed me. He told me to come on down, it was going to be a long night. I kissed Saba good night, told him I would be a couple of hours, but to hold my space on the bed. I grabbed some cloths, a Coke, a snack and a bottle of water and headed into the office.
A bad guy shot at one of our officers, he was barricaded in a different location and SWAT was called out. It seems strange to look back now: it was the middle of the night and the telephones were ringing, I was running reports and I was working on my part of the investigations. Things were running along the normal path of an investigation, different groups were called in to assist. The brass was scattered over the two sites, I had detectives standing by, detectives on sites and detectives in the office. About 6:00 I was wondering if I should head home for a couple of hours but when I checked with the Sergeant in charge, he told me no, we were waiting for the barricaded subject and things could change quickly.
I called T to see if she could feed Saba, but I called a bit late, she was already on the way to school to drop her son off. I didn’t want to call too early, I found out I don’t’ know my friends morning routines very well. I couldn’t call Cranky, she was out of town. I am so glad Saba has his doggie door now; I knew he might be hungry, but otherwise he would be fine. (Cranky managed to feed him breakfast some time later in the afternoon.)
I could hear people show up for there normal shifts, I knew the time was ticking by and was on the phone and the computer. I have no idea how many pots of coffee I made yesterday but it was a constant chore. I briefed my Sergeant when she got back in for the morning shift. I was watching the clock to see who was due in next. I paged one of my favorite detectives: I asked if he could buy me something when he stopped for his coffee on the way in, I was starving. He brought me a nice snack and I was grateful.
Things were heating up as it got closer to my normal start time. The telephones were going, I had people scattered everywhere and thank goodness I had the wireless headset for this event: I could make it around the floor, to the copier, to the detectives offices, the coffee pot and wasn’t forced to sit at my desk the whole time. I got a nasty little page that I had parked my personal vehicle in a senior staff parking spot and needed to move my car ASAP. I grumbled a bit, grabbed my keys and a smoke: told the bossed I had to go move my car. It pissed me off a bit: I don’t have a parking space assigned to me, I took what was empty hours ago when I got called in. I called the person that paged me back after I moved my car and asked that he explain to the senior staff that I had been in all night and had lost track of time. He was nice about it; I was trying not to be angry with the messenger.
The day continued: the bad guy was barricaded all morning. There were the other cases that had happened over the weekend that were getting worked. At couple points during the day, I lost track of all my detectives. I didn’t know who was where: what they were working on and I think I need to address that. It could become a scary situation if something bad happened to them, I wouldn’t know where to start. As one case slowed down, the barricaded bad guy was in custody, the other cases were gearing up.
There were people coming and going all day. Some had been sent home to sleep they had been up most of the night and were needed for the afternoon. They got there rest and I was still working when the got back in. I did leave at my normal time last night; some of them were still at work when I left. By the time my day ended, 17 hours at the office later; I was ready to take my place back next to Saba in my bed.
I have always read that the first 24 hours on a murder case are critical. It is true, I managed to hang in there for 17 of those and kept things moving along with my little part of the investigations.
