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Authors: Joseph Wambaugh
Tags: General, True Crime
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wife when they got married.
He thought that pyros were interesting. He learned that they made up less than 5 percent of arson suspects and that typically they were loners.
John wrote: "The fire becomes a friend they can relate to. Their fires bring attention, friends, admiration as heroes, and self-esteem. Like a drug addict, one good score leads to the desire for another."
In the August 1982 issue of American Fire Journal, a Glendale battalion chief wrote about his new Arson/Explosives Unit.
During the first thirteen months, 153 incidents were investigated by the unit: 78 cases were cleared, 25 arrests were made, 23 cases were filed, resulting in 11 convictions. In addition, 29 cases were referred for inter-agency counseling. Cases cleared by the unit were approximately 21 percent above the national average. Additionally, incidents involving arson dropped to 31 percent within the first year. When news media carried the stories it had an immediate effect on those who may have had arson in mind.
So it seemed to everyone that the "marriage" of cop and firefighter was working. But, as with the other unions in John Orr's life, this one was shaky. He suffered a truly humiliating experience.
"Dennis treated me like a training officer," he reported. "With his rookie on a leash, he belittled me publicly because one night I wore a gun while processing a fire scene. A reporter showed up and asked Dennis how the unit was working out, and he responded, 'Jdeghn still has to work out his wanna-be image. He's in there now digging around a fire scene wearing a gun. What's he need a pistol for? It's a fire scene and we're the only ones around.' "
The quote appeared in the Glendale News-Press the very next day, and of course, the horse laughs could be heard in every firehouse in town. John Orr said that his partnership with Dennis Wilson henceforth looked like "a marriage of convenience."
And the other one wasn't doing too hot either. He and his wife of one year could have a three-hour debate about how long to cook a meat loaf.
Of course, there was nothing that infuriated a real cop more than to have a fireman solve his cases for him. And John Orr did solve a few, including one involving a stolen and torched Mercedes convertible that was used by a pair of residential burglars to haul away loot, including guns and jewelry.
It was a no-suspects case, but he and his partner started to canvass the neighborhood, several blocks in every direction from the Mercedes dump site, and they came up with a few rumors about some neighborhood bad guys. Then they put on Public Service Department shirts, knocked on doors, and made cold calls on the phone, posing as employees of the Water and Power Department.
Finally they ended up at the house of a local thug who'd been in a lot of trouble in his life, and when John Orr learned that the dude happened to be out of town, he went undercover for the first time, playing the part of an old jailhouse cellmate. He wangled a recent snapshot of the guy, and learned that he'd been at a recent party given by the burglary victim.
One burglar got state prison time and the other was put on probation, and, any way you cut it, some good police work was done by the wanna-be and his partner.
He sent his writing to American Fire Journal. After he submitted a piece about training burns of abandoned houses, the editor asked for more. So he wrote another examining the mind and methods of a serial fire setter. John Orr's reputation in the local fire-fighting community was becoming significant.
And his personal life seemed to be taking a turn for the better in 1983, despite what he saw as his third wife's argumentative style. He reported, "I typically stayed home evenings helping her daughters with homework, preparing brown bag lunches for the next day, along with Ozzie-and - Harriet-like family amusements."
Except that later in the year, Ozzie hauled ass yet another time. They eventually were divorced, but remained
He thought that pyros were interesting. He learned that they made up less than 5 percent of arson suspects and that typically they were loners.
John wrote: "The fire becomes a friend they can relate to. Their fires bring attention, friends, admiration as heroes, and self-esteem. Like a drug addict, one good score leads to the desire for another."
In the August 1982 issue of American Fire Journal, a Glendale battalion chief wrote about his new Arson/Explosives Unit.
During the first thirteen months, 153 incidents were investigated by the unit: 78 cases were cleared, 25 arrests were made, 23 cases were filed, resulting in 11 convictions. In addition, 29 cases were referred for inter-agency counseling. Cases cleared by the unit were approximately 21 percent above the national average. Additionally, incidents involving arson dropped to 31 percent within the first year. When news media carried the stories it had an immediate effect on those who may have had arson in mind.
So it seemed to everyone that the "marriage" of cop and firefighter was working. But, as with the other unions in John Orr's life, this one was shaky. He suffered a truly humiliating experience.
"Dennis treated me like a training officer," he reported. "With his rookie on a leash, he belittled me publicly because one night I wore a gun while processing a fire scene. A reporter showed up and asked Dennis how the unit was working out, and he responded, 'Jdeghn still has to work out his wanna-be image. He's in there now digging around a fire scene wearing a gun. What's he need a pistol for? It's a fire scene and we're the only ones around.' "
The quote appeared in the Glendale News-Press the very next day, and of course, the horse laughs could be heard in every firehouse in town. John Orr said that his partnership with Dennis Wilson henceforth looked like "a marriage of convenience."
And the other one wasn't doing too hot either. He and his wife of one year could have a three-hour debate about how long to cook a meat loaf.
Of course, there was nothing that infuriated a real cop more than to have a fireman solve his cases for him. And John Orr did solve a few, including one involving a stolen and torched Mercedes convertible that was used by a pair of residential burglars to haul away loot, including guns and jewelry.
It was a no-suspects case, but he and his partner started to canvass the neighborhood, several blocks in every direction from the Mercedes dump site, and they came up with a few rumors about some neighborhood bad guys. Then they put on Public Service Department shirts, knocked on doors, and made cold calls on the phone, posing as employees of the Water and Power Department.
Finally they ended up at the house of a local thug who'd been in a lot of trouble in his life, and when John Orr learned that the dude happened to be out of town, he went undercover for the first time, playing the part of an old jailhouse cellmate. He wangled a recent snapshot of the guy, and learned that he'd been at a recent party given by the burglary victim.
One burglar got state prison time and the other was put on probation, and, any way you cut it, some good police work was done by the wanna-be and his partner.
He sent his writing to American Fire Journal. After he submitted a piece about training burns of abandoned houses, the editor asked for more. So he wrote another examining the mind and methods of a serial fire setter. John Orr's reputation in the local fire-fighting community was becoming significant.
And his personal life seemed to be taking a turn for the better in 1983, despite what he saw as his third wife's argumentative style. He reported, "I typically stayed home evenings helping her daughters with homework, preparing brown bag lunches for the next day, along with Ozzie-and - Harriet-like family amusements."
Except that later in the year, Ozzie hauled ass yet another time. They eventually were divorced, but remained
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