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A dead guy in the middle of the road.
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One night, years ago, I looked out my window and
noticed that there was a dead guy in the middle of the road. It was just the
other day that I found myself thinking of that night… that night I saw him just
lying there, belly up, right in the middle of the street. I have no idea why I
thought about him, but I did.
The incident had happened a long time ago… I’m
talking late seventies or so. Nevertheless I thought of him that day, which
brings me to my point. I have learned that when random memories like this pop
into my mind that I should write it down.
A lot of times, as an author, I incorporate
versions of actual events to give my writing realism. Some are incidents that I
have witnessed personally; others are stories that have been told to me. When I
started writing my novel “Number Five” I came to a point in the story where it
fit, so I put it in. You will see a version of this story in a later chapter of
“Number Five” as I post it on line a chapter at a time. However, today I
thought I would give you an inside look as to where the story in the book came
from.
Although the circumstances of this story will
remain the same, I am going to change a couple of things to protect the
innocent and the guilty. For the sake of
argument, let’s say I was in a second story hotel room that overlooked a
downtown street. As with many large cities there is an area were there
are a lot of restaurants and bars in close proximity to one another. As a
result two o’clock found a lot of drunken people on the streets at the same
time, all trying to figure out how they would get home.
The drunks were loud as drunks tend to be and I
couldn’t sleep anyway as what happens sometimes when I travel. By three o’clock
I was still awake, but at least I couldn’t hear the drunks anymore, most likely
because they were all gone by now.
I walked over to the window and looked out and that
was when I saw him. I saw a man lying on his back in the middle of the street. He
was a burly man as evidenced by his beer belly protruding up. His shirt was
open, exposing way too much chest hair (because that’s how we rolled in those
days). He wasn’t moving; in fact... he appeared to be dead. I suppose it was possible that
he had had a heart attack and happened to drop dead where he lay, but it was
more likely that he had gotten run down. It occurred to me to call the police,
but before I could, the police arrived. I was off to one side in a darkened
room so I was sure they couldn’t see me. So, I just sat there and listened and
watched them work.
I learned a couple of things. The dividing line
between the city and county jurisdictions had been painted in the street. It
was a thick yellow, dotted line and the dead man was just this side of it,
making him the jurisdiction and responsibility of the City police. Now you
wouldn’t think so because they never show this part on TV, but the paperwork
involved in dealing with a dead body is substantial, especially when the death
is obviously not the result of natural causes.
Then there are other considerations too, as I soon
found out.
According to the police officer’s conversation they
were speculating that the dead guy had been drunk and had staggered from one of
the bars. All of the bars were closed, so he was probably headed home. He had
probably wandered into the street and gotten run over, most likely by another
drunk. The truth was, they didn’t know what really happened. That meant that
this death had to be treated as a homicide until it could be determined whether
his being run over was accidental or intentional.
That meant waking up homicide detectives.
It also meant that they would be stuck standing in
the middle of the street for hours guarding a dead guy until the homicide
detectives arrived.
No street cop wanted to do that.
I studied the police officers that had arrived. One
was a kid, a rookie by the looks of him, fresh out of the academy and clueless.
His partner was a grizzled old veteran and he was not happy. After a moment of
listening to the veteran cursing, I knew the reason why. Apparently someone,
probably a deputy from the County Sheriff’s Department had come upon the body
earlier. It was apparent that someone, probably the Deputy, had dragged
the dead guy from the county side of the dividing line to the city side. That
act had instantly changed the responsibility of investigating this death from a
“County” problem to a “City” problem.
So what do you imagine the city cops did. The
grizzled old veteran grabbed the dead man by his legs and dragged him back
across to the county side of the line. I could hear the veteran explaining the
rules to the rookie as they walked over to the pay phone just below my window. The
gist of what he said was that they couldn’t let those bastards get away with
it.
These days they would just dial 911 and leave the receiver dangling and the police would arrive. They didn’t have 911 yet or even push button phones
for that matter, so the grizzled old veteran had to deposit coins and then dial all seven digits on a
rotary phone. The officer made an anonymous call to the county dispatcher reporting
a dead guy in the middle of the street. The veteran gave the location and then hung
up and smiled, thoroughly pleased with himself. Then the two city police
officers climbed back into their car, made a hasty U-turn and sped away.
The county deputies arrived in less than two minutes, another rookie/veteran team and they were not happy. I don’t know if
they were the ones who had dragged the dead guy the first time, but that’s what they did this time. They could tell that the dead guy had been moved so they returned the favor. They walked over to the same phone booth and made a call to
the City Police dispatcher. Their call was remarkably similar to the one the city
police officer had just made.
The original city police team responded and
discovered the dead guy back on their side of the line and after a few moments
of cursing and arm waving they grabbed the dead guy and drug him back. This
time they didn’t go off to the pay phone. They called it in with their radios
and waited there in the street for the deputies. It didn’t take long for the deputies
to arrive; it had only been a few minutes so they hadn’t had a chance to get
very far away.
Before long the cops and deputies were in the middle of the street yelling at one another, each staying on their side of the line like it was a border between
two unfriendly countries. They were arguing as to who would take
responsibility for the investigation of the dead guy. Eventually more cops
arrived and then inevitably supervisors. The dead guy was lying splayed
on the ground between the cops, uncovered, undignified, undisturbed because no
one wanted to touch him if it would be witnessed by the other side… I guess that would constitute ownership or something.
I didn’t stick around to see who ultimately had to
take the investigation. The sun was coming up, shift change had occurred. An
entirely new group of officers had arrived and were in the process of sorting
it out by the time I got dressed and went down to the coffee shop for breakfast.
No way was I getting any sleep with all of that
yelling going on.
While I ate breakfast it occurred to me that it
doesn’t matter how “exciting” or “meaningful” your job is. From Astronaut to Zookeeper, at some point, if you do it long enough, it becomes boring and
routine. I have watched enough TV reality shows… watched enough news
coverage to know that a police officer’s job can be exciting and meaningful.
But with every job, at some point, you can become callous enough to drag a dead
guy a few feet across a line painted in the street. You temporarily forget your oath to "protect and serve", rather you think about how close it is to the end of watch... you are tired, you want to go home. The last thing you want is to get stuck with a bunch of paper work.
You do this without even stopping for a second to consider that somewhere there was a family waiting for this guy to come home. Wondering where he was, wondering what was taking him so long. The family had no idea that he was lying on his back on a nearly deserted street. That he was as dead as a door knob, and had been for hours while the police dragged him back and forth across a line that decided who would get stuck with the paperwork.
You do this without even stopping for a second to consider that somewhere there was a family waiting for this guy to come home. Wondering where he was, wondering what was taking him so long. The family had no idea that he was lying on his back on a nearly deserted street. That he was as dead as a door knob, and had been for hours while the police dragged him back and forth across a line that decided who would get stuck with the paperwork.
***
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