Police Officers

www.officer.com --Their forums have given me lots of great stuff.

I spent over 20 years working in a small city. We had the same crimes as NYC just not as many of them (and not as many cops to deal with them either). When you get to specific questions, I'll be happy to try to answer.

Big differences between NYC and a small city - they can throw 100 cops at a problem, we only had 100 cops altogether.

Also try Lee Lofland's book "Police Procedure and Investigation" one of the Howdunnits put out by Writer's Digest. A lot of great information, plus he tells some of his stories from being a cop.

I'm a big fan of this guy: http://thelawdogfiles.blogspot.com/

He's a cop in a small Texas town, so I'm not sure how much of it will be applicable, but it's a good read anyway. In particular, I would recommend a couple of semi-fictional collaborations he had with some other emergency personnel regarding...

A drunk-driving accident

and another medical emergency.

Again, this may differ in flavor from a NYC cop, but the emotions are probably universal.

Ravenlocks said:

http://forums.realpolice.net/forumdisplay.php?f=112

Click to expand...

Overall some pretty nice guys and gals over there, but they're not generally huge fans of people signing up and their first post being a question for a screenplay/novel. Nonetheless, you may get some responses, and just try and keep a thick skin. Sarcasm is a virtue (for the regulars) over there.

We had a NY police officer join AW this site this week. You could PM him and see if he is willing to chat with you. Here is his newbie thread post so you can find him easily.

http://www.absolutewrite.com/forums/showthread.php?t=112545

Good luck!

RJK said:

I spent over 20 years working in a small city. We had the same crimes as NYC just not as many of them (and not as many cops to deal with them either). When you get to specific questions, I'll be happy to try to answer.

Big differences between NYC and a small city - they can throw 100 cops at a problem, we only had 100 cops altogether.

Click to expand...

Ha. We had 350. Only about 100 knew what they were doing, however.

I'm not sure if this is exactly what you mean, but I read this book when I started my journey into law enforcement:

http://www.amazon.com/dp/0671747401/?tag=absolutewritedm-20

It is a bit dated now though (since the class he wrote about was in 1988) and I'm sure that information has changed a lot since then.

There is another series of books written by a former Las Vegas Metro officer that collects real stories from a variety of cops. I hope you forgive me if I can't recall the author or name of the series anymore - I remembered him only because he was featured in some of the early episodes of "Cops" and I remembered thinking that he's a jackass (at least as shown on the television program and because he reminds me of several officers I work with who are jackasses).

But, I must also caution you that there is no 'standard' for the live of a cop on or off the job. I'm very different from most of my peers and they are from me. We work a smaller agency (would be happy to have 100 deputies!) so know each other a lot better. Which is both a blessing and a curse. In that, I know that I'm different from most of my peers in a lot of regards and exactly the same as they in a lot of regards.

I usually advise, and I think the others that work in law enforcement would echo the sentiment, try not to think of cops as one entity but a bunch of individuals with their own sets of values, mores, ethics and life codes. Hell, even life skills! I know officers who are great with other officers but not anyone else.

Myself? I'm not great with anyone but have a reputation for following through on what I'll say I'll do.

Rabe...