Advocate: Well, what would you guys like to talk about lately?
Rick: I don’t know. Not much has really been going on lately.
Advocate: We have to come up with something.
Rick: I was in a 100-mile car chase out to East Texas where the suspect ended up killing himself at the end.
Advocate: What happened?
Rick: We were doing some extra patrol work Friday night as part of the violent crime task force. We had just started when we heard there was a robbery in progress at a chicken restaurant. We spotted the suspect’s vehicle, and he led us to and through Oak Cliff, I don’t even know where, and then out to East Texas on Interstate 20. The total chase went 100 miles one way and lasted an hour and 13 minutes.
Advocate: Can Dallas police legally chase someone out that far?
Rick: The procedure is, once we get out there, we call the Texas Department of Public Safety. During the chase, the guy started shooting at the DPS officers, and they returned fire. It ended up he (the suspect) put a gun to his head and died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound.
Advocate: Is it frightening racing down the highway at 100 miles per hour getting shot at?
Pam: I think it’s scarier being the passenger, because the driver is in control.
Rick: Yeah, I had a good partner that night, and he was keeping an eye out for the traffic. We had a couple of water bottles with us; we had just filled them up. Your body works so hard during a chase, concentrating so hard, that you really just dry out.
Jim: Of course, you never really get up that much speed during a chase, except on the freeways.
Rick: We were up to 105 (miles per hour) on the freeway. But the helicopter really helps out there. You know, a Channel 8 van got a ticket for speeding as part of the chase. The Balch Springs police pulled them over just as they were getting into the chase.
Advocate: Is that pretty typical? Does the media usually get into a high-speed chase? They aren’t legally entitled to break the law, are they?
Rick: No. The funny thing was, when it was all over, the TV van driver wanted us to “take care” of his ticket.
Advocate: Did you?
Rick: No. He was a little mad about that, too. He acted like he was kidding, but I’m not so sure.
Advocate: Has the media ever contributed to any problems by becoming involved in a chase around here?
Rick: We haven’t had any injuries, as far as I know, when the media has gotten involved in a chase.
Advocate: Do you guys become involved in high-speed chases very often?
Pam: We were involved in a bike-car chase the other day. Rick and I tried to pull this guy over, and he took off. Rick was right behind the car, and I was way behind him. People were pulling over on the street – they couldn’t believe it.
Rick: The guy kept making turns, and I stayed up with him pretty well until a squad car pulled him over.
Pam: And the guy got out of the car, and he told the arresting officer: ‘Did you see that crazy guy on the bike? I kept losing him, and he kept coming back. I need to get a bigger engine.’
Jim: You can get into some weird situations in a chase. I remember one that was memorable, even though it wasn’t particularly exciting. I was in a chase, sort-of, on I-35 at LBJ, and a (police) car radioed ahead to try and cut him off.
We got all of the squad cars into position at Walnut Hill to cut him off, and we kept waiting and waiting and waiting. It didn’t seem like he was ever going to get there. And finally, there he comes, going about 10 miles per hour. It turned out he was on drugs and was just a zombie. It took him forever to get there, he was driving so slowly.
Rick: I chased a horse once on a Sunday afternoon. I happened to be sitting at LBJ and the Tollway, and a call about an escaped horse came over the radio. Sure enough, there was the horse. So I started chasing, and about a half-mile later in a residential area, the horse just ran into a porch and stopped. And this lady was driving by, and she offered me a bridle. She said: ‘Do you think you might need this?’ Well, I didn’t have one with me, so I took it.
Then, the lady who lived in the house came out, and she was pretty mad. She kept telling me to get the horse off the porch.
Advocate: Has anything else been happening?
Pam: I took the sarg’s car over to Roseland Homes (a City housing project at Hall and Munger) the other day, and we were gone three minutes max, and we were gone three minutes max, and we come back, and there was a brick through the windshield. Really, we couldn’t have been gone more than three minutes.
Advocate: What are you guys doing for vacation this summer?
Rick: We’re going to New Mexico, Arizona, Nevada – my wife loves it out there.
Pam: We’re buying a house May 29.
Rick: Yeah, it’s a big one, too.
Pam: Hey, yours is pretty big, too.
Advocate: I guess we should tell everyone when you guys will be on vacation, so all the robbers will know when to visit you.
Rick: Well, Pam lives at…
Pam: Hey. (Laughter) We’ll probably go up to Wisconsin this summer, where a lot of my family lives.
Advocate: How about you, Jim?
Jim: I’m in the police choir, and we’re planning a trip to Weisbaden, Germany, in September.
Advocate: How many officers are in the police choir?
Jim: There are 42 on the roster, but we’re lucky to have about half who are there for most concerts. We’re restricted to four performances per month, so we perform for civic groups, whatever, just about anyone who gives us a call.
Advocate: Take it easy, guys. See you next month.
