Read Online Hollywood Crows by Joseph Wambaugh - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: Joseph Wambaugh
Tags: Fiction, General, Mystery & Detective, Mystery Fiction, Police, California, Police Procedural, Los Angeles, Police - California - Los Angeles, Hollywood (Los Angeles; Calif.)
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some crack she could make about their dumb-looking, bleached-out spiky hair, Gert saw that the PODD had bumped the cell phone and it was sliding clear off the deck lid of the car.
She said, “Shit!” and tried to catch it with her left hand before it hit the asphalt, but she touched the PODD and it started sliding. Now she was trying to catch both instruments with her left hand. And she accidentally touched the trigger with her right.
The evening began with a bang, all right. A big one. Doomsday Dan Applewhite yelled like he’d been shot. He’d been bent over the open trunk of his shop and leaped back from the explosion, twisting clumsily and falling down on his hip. His P1 partner, young Gil Ponce, who was one month from completing his eighteen-month probation, instinctively crouched and drew his Beretta.
Officer Von Braun’s shotgun had been pointed skyward, so the explosion did no damage, except to the psyche of Officer Applewhite. Within a minute, there were three supervisors running into the parking lot, including the lieutenant and Sergeant Treakle. Gert Von Braun was scared, mortified, and greatly relieved when she saw that she’d not blown away a cop, though she knew she’d be facing disciplinary action for the accidental discharge.
“You okay?” the lieutenant asked the senior field training officer, whose face had gone white.
“I think so,” Dan Applewhite said. Then he added, “I’m not sure. I better run over to Cedars and get MT’d. I went down hard.”
To the supervisors of Dan Applewhite, it went without saying that he’d go for medical treatment, since his retirement date was nearing. A paper cut could send him to Cedars-Sinai or Hollywood Presbyterian, demanding a tetanus shot. He was determined to have recorded on paper any injury he’d suffered while on duty as an active cop in case some disability popped up during his retirement years, as he was sure it would.
Gert Von Braun followed the supervisors into the station to give her statement for the 1.28 personnel complaint while the surfer cops jumped into their shop and cleared for calls, hoping they wouldn’t somehow get blamed for harassing, enraging, and distracting a recognized gunfighter who wore a size 44 Sam Browne. They needn’t have worried, though. Gert was told she’d probably end up with an official reprimand, and she took it like a man.
After the supervisors and Gert Von Braun were gone, Dan Applewhite’s twenty-two-year-old boot turned to his shaken partner and said, “Want me to drive tonight?”
Wordlessly, the older cop handed Gil the keys to their shop. Phantom pains were already burning Dan’s left hip and running down into his femur. He wondered if this would lead to eventual hip replacement. He’d heard horror stories of staph infection that crippled patients after hip surgery, and he got a terrifying mental picture of himself trying to negotiate the steps to his apartment with a walker.
Unhappily for the older cop, but happily for his young P1, the ER was jammed with patients who had real injuries that needed treatment. LAPD officer or not, Dan Applewhite was told that he’d have to wait an hour, maybe more, before a doctor could see him.
“How’re you feeling now?” Gil asked his partner, whose lean body was twisted gingerly onto his good hip as he sat contorted.
A six-year-old Latino boy whose mother was experiencing contractions was watching Dan Applewhite. Finally he said to the wiry cop, “Why do you sit down so funny? You look like a blue grasshopper.”
Dan Applewhite ignored the kid but said to Gil Ponce, “Let’s get the hell outta here. But if anything happens as a result of this, I want you as witness. I’m in pain from my hip…”
“To your lip,” Gil said, then with his FTO glaring at him added, “Sorry. Just trying to cheer you up. Let’s get you a cup of coffee.”
Like Hollywood Nate, Doomsday Dan was one of the Starbucks cops and would rather endure severe caffeine
She said, “Shit!” and tried to catch it with her left hand before it hit the asphalt, but she touched the PODD and it started sliding. Now she was trying to catch both instruments with her left hand. And she accidentally touched the trigger with her right.
The evening began with a bang, all right. A big one. Doomsday Dan Applewhite yelled like he’d been shot. He’d been bent over the open trunk of his shop and leaped back from the explosion, twisting clumsily and falling down on his hip. His P1 partner, young Gil Ponce, who was one month from completing his eighteen-month probation, instinctively crouched and drew his Beretta.
Officer Von Braun’s shotgun had been pointed skyward, so the explosion did no damage, except to the psyche of Officer Applewhite. Within a minute, there were three supervisors running into the parking lot, including the lieutenant and Sergeant Treakle. Gert Von Braun was scared, mortified, and greatly relieved when she saw that she’d not blown away a cop, though she knew she’d be facing disciplinary action for the accidental discharge.
“You okay?” the lieutenant asked the senior field training officer, whose face had gone white.
“I think so,” Dan Applewhite said. Then he added, “I’m not sure. I better run over to Cedars and get MT’d. I went down hard.”
To the supervisors of Dan Applewhite, it went without saying that he’d go for medical treatment, since his retirement date was nearing. A paper cut could send him to Cedars-Sinai or Hollywood Presbyterian, demanding a tetanus shot. He was determined to have recorded on paper any injury he’d suffered while on duty as an active cop in case some disability popped up during his retirement years, as he was sure it would.
Gert Von Braun followed the supervisors into the station to give her statement for the 1.28 personnel complaint while the surfer cops jumped into their shop and cleared for calls, hoping they wouldn’t somehow get blamed for harassing, enraging, and distracting a recognized gunfighter who wore a size 44 Sam Browne. They needn’t have worried, though. Gert was told she’d probably end up with an official reprimand, and she took it like a man.
After the supervisors and Gert Von Braun were gone, Dan Applewhite’s twenty-two-year-old boot turned to his shaken partner and said, “Want me to drive tonight?”
Wordlessly, the older cop handed Gil the keys to their shop. Phantom pains were already burning Dan’s left hip and running down into his femur. He wondered if this would lead to eventual hip replacement. He’d heard horror stories of staph infection that crippled patients after hip surgery, and he got a terrifying mental picture of himself trying to negotiate the steps to his apartment with a walker.
Unhappily for the older cop, but happily for his young P1, the ER was jammed with patients who had real injuries that needed treatment. LAPD officer or not, Dan Applewhite was told that he’d have to wait an hour, maybe more, before a doctor could see him.
“How’re you feeling now?” Gil asked his partner, whose lean body was twisted gingerly onto his good hip as he sat contorted.
A six-year-old Latino boy whose mother was experiencing contractions was watching Dan Applewhite. Finally he said to the wiry cop, “Why do you sit down so funny? You look like a blue grasshopper.”
Dan Applewhite ignored the kid but said to Gil Ponce, “Let’s get the hell outta here. But if anything happens as a result of this, I want you as witness. I’m in pain from my hip…”
“To your lip,” Gil said, then with his FTO glaring at him added, “Sorry. Just trying to cheer you up. Let’s get you a cup of coffee.”
Like Hollywood Nate, Doomsday Dan was one of the Starbucks cops and would rather endure severe caffeine
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