FanStory.com - My Last Arrest . . . I Hopeby Douglas Goff

Thirty years of working for the government wore me down, both mentally and physically. High speed pursuits, bailouts, foot chases, and fights take their toll.

My knees are shot and my back is sore more days than not. Understandably, I found myself growing mentally tired of dealing with the criminal element types.

My final year working as a federal agent, I sustained three injuries.The first one came when a subject resisted arrest and I pulled a shoulder muscle while wrestling with him trying to get him cuffed.

The second injury happened during a foot pursuit, where I stepped into a deep hole while running and twisted my ankle. I limped for two weeks.

The last one occurred during a fist fight with a felon a month before my retirement. I ended up in an emergency room. Yeah, it was time to go. My body was telling me that I was getting too old to be on the streets.

In 2019, at fifty years old, I pulled the trigger and separated from the government. It was bittersweet, but the thought of no more ‘cuffing and stuffing’ was extremely appealing. I took on some security jobs to supplement my income.

In October of 2021, I was parked in the lot of a factory located in Kalamazoo, Michigan. The company had fired a man who made some threats, and their insurance policy required that they hire armed security for a few weeks until the threat subsided.

I had worked security at this factory numerous times for the same type of threats, and while Kalamazoo is a rough area, the facility is located in a large industrial complex that covers several square blocks. Working ‘active shooter threats’ may seem dangerous, but 99.99% of the subjects turn out to be blowhards releasing steam as they are upset at their perceived mistreatment.

The man who made the threat this go around had smoked a fat blunt (his words) while on his break and after returning to work, nearly sliced his fingers off while operating a million dollar box cutting machine. After the company paid to stitch him up, they fired him. Their audacity really perturbed the man, so he threatened to come back and hurt some people. Now it was midnight and I was sure he was currently in a marijuana haze somewhere and would not return, so I settled in for another long, boring night shift.

At 2:00 AM, one of the unarmed, permanent plant security guards pulled into the parking lot I was in. He parked a few rows over and cut his lights off.

We shared a radio channel but I didn’t bother to call him. Night night time. The permanent guards were notoriously lazy, and often parked near us for safety and would sleep for hours.

At 2:05 AM, the radio crackled to life, “Security this is Foreman Roger at the KZ building. Someone is trying to steal a hi-lo.”

No answer.

This is not an issue for me. I was here for a threat at the building that I was sitting in front of. Permanent security was supposed to handle all other issues. Still, no lights came on from his car. No way he’s asleep already? I rolled up to his driver's side. Way. His head was resting against the window and he was out like a light. I could even hear him snoring through his window.

After three honks, the guard rolled down the window, bleary eyed.

“Are you going to respond to that?” I questioned.

“Respond to what?” He cut loose a big yawn.

“Anyone copy? We need assistance at the KZ building. A man is stealing a hi-lo lift.”

“That.”

“Oh. Maybe I should go. Where’s the KZ building at?”

What in the actual fuck? This guy’s a permanent employee here and doesn’t know where a building is? Security my ass.

“Oh shit. He just swung the bucket at me and my men. He’s having trouble getting it into gear. We need help!” Foreman Roger’s voice had raised several octaves with panic.

How nice. Now I need to respond as there was an imminent danger threat. Numbnuts hadn't moved and was just sitting there staring at me with a dull, blank look on his face. Problem is, I didn’t know where the KZ building was either.

But I did know where it wasn’t. I had worked at about seven of the main buildings in the past and none were KZ. I had never worked on the south side of the complex. KZ had to be over there somewhere.

I raced south and turned into the first building area I was unfamiliar with. I immediately saw a group of men surrounding an orange 5,600 pound hi-lo lift, trying to prevent it from leaving. A large dirt bucket at the front end of the vehicle was bouncing up and down. Are they really planning on stopping that large construction machine with their pot-bellies?

When I parked, I saw that the dull-eyed guard had followed me. Guess I have my Robin. I jumped from my marked security vehicle and ran over, observing a disheveled man sitting in the hi-lo.

One of the unauthorized intruder’s hands was pushing a lever up and down that seemed to be bouncing the bucket, while his other hand was jerking on another lever that was grinding the gears. This was causing him to giggle while a six-inch stream of drool dangled from his lower lip. Had the zombie apocalypse started?

A man in a hard hat approached me, yelling,”I called the police, but they can’t find the building.”

“Get your guys back, before they get hit by that bucket," I ordered the man, who I assumed must be Foreman Roger. I have a solid plan. We’ll wait for the police.

Just then, the construction vehicle lurched forward, as the giggling bandit nearly got it into gear. There were several parked cars nearby and a number of civilians still milling about. If the perpetrator got the hi-lo moving, somebody was going to get hurt. Fuck balls. There went my brilliant ‘waiting for the police’ plan.

I turned to tell the full time security guy that we needed to take this thief down, and was surprised to see that the guard had never exited his vehicle and was staring at me from the safety of his car with a look on his face that could only be described as . . . fear.

What in the actual fuck? When I’m done with ‘Henry High-Low’, I swear to shit I’m going to pepper spray the piss out of this guard. Ignoring the military swear-storm that was swirling around in my head, I hollered, “Seriously? Just going to ride this one out in your car?” The guard must have felt guilty, because he slowly exited his vehicle.

With a loud grinding sound, the hi-lo jumped backwards, this time hitting a waist-high concrete parking barrier positioned behind it.

Shit. Still no cops. “Let’s go,” I said to my shaky partner, who quickly raised his hands, palms out, and took a large step backwards.

Damn it. “Hold my flashlight.” I tossed it at him, realizing he would be more of a hindrance than a help during the takedown.

Avoiding the bouncing bucket, I approached the construction vehicle, where the would-be thief mumbled, “Goin’ fer a rideee.”

I grabbed the man by his jacket and pant leg and yanked him clean out of the hi-lo. At that moment, a few things caught my attention. A large empty bottle of Fireball fell from his pocket, clattering to the ground. Oddly, he seemed to be wearing pajama pants. Finally, the man had a bloody white gauze wrapped all the way around his head and he also had wet blood stains around his groin area. (Disgustingly, I discovered the wet blood with my hand when I pulled him from the machine.)

“Goin fer a rideee!” His breath reeked of booze. Yeah, buddy, not tonight you aren’t.

He struggled with me, trying to climb back into the hi-lo, so I pinned his smaller body against the large tire of the construction vehicle. This quickly evolved into a game that many criminals like to play. It’s called hide-and-seek with their hands. He went for the most popular hiding spot, his armpits. Thank God he didn’t try the second most popular, the groin.

As I attempted to pull the man’s arms free to cuff him, I saw two hands come in from my left to assist. Awesome. Lazy-butt decided to jump in. But, it wasn’t my fellow guard, it was Foreman Roger to the rescue.

Once cuffed, I took the man over to my security car and leaned him over the hood as three police cars pulled in, lights and sirens blaring. Once they took custody of the subject, they told me that last night, the man had ripped out his catheter and escaped from the mental hospital located downtown. He must have done some number on his ‘junk’ from the amount of blood that was on his hospital pants.

I wrote a report for my bosses, who praised me up one side and down the other, telling me what a fantastic job I did. One boss even said he was proud that I worked for the company. Damn that feels good.

The next day, the same boss sent out a company-wide email telling everyone NOT to do what I did and advised everyone that I should have stayed at my post. All of my work associates thought that I had been reprimanded. Damn that felt bad.

I retired from the government to get away from that kind of crap. Yet here I am, still floating with the turds. I guess the more things change, the more they stay the same. I had simply switched toilet bowls.