Violent Crime In The USA From A Cop

0:00A fight over control of a police officer's gun and shots fired. This is a very special episode. In this episode, the guest is me. In particular, my appearance as a guest on the Law Matters radio show broadcast on KV-O-I-A-M radio in Tucson, Arizona. Law Matters host Sherry Harrison interviews me. We talk about the violent incident that ended my police career. Gun control and much more. Welcome to the Law Enforcement Talk Radio Show. In the Law Enforcement Talk Radio Show, we are joined by special guest, talking about their experiences, their realities of investigating crimes. Plus, those who have experienced rents trauma, police, first responders, military and victims of crime share their stories. Hi, I'm John J. Wiley. In addition to being a broadcaster, I'm also a retired police sergeant. Be sure to check out our website, L-E-T-Radio.com and also like us on Facebook.

1:00Search for the Law Enforcement Talk Radio Show. I want to make an announcement. We're, again, mourning the loss of a good guy. One of our amazing borrower star agents, Border Patrol Supervisor Agent Daniel Cox, a 24-year devoted servant to his country, was killed this week. This is a senseless tragedy and it just breaks my heart. But on behalf of lawmakers, and we offer our prayers, our sympathy to his family and his work family, and I'll never get used to making these announcements. And our guest today is J. Wiley from Law Enforcement out of Florida, and J, thank you for joining us. Pleasure to be here with you, Sherry. Thanks for having me on your show. It's very much appreciated. You're right. It's intolerable when this news happens, and it never gets easier, and it brings up memories of so many people that have died in a lot of duty, and their service or sacrifice is always

2:03appreciated by me. Oh, absolutely. I want to talk to you about everything. But before we get started, tell our listeners about you. What's your history, your work history, and I know you do a show in Florida. Tell us why you do the show. Well, first, I'm a retired Baltimore city police sergeant. I got hurt and retired young in what the news media loves to call the unarmed man incident who tried to shoot me with my service weapon, most on my hand. Fortunately, he survived. I survived. I got a lot of spray in my wrist, and after multiple surgeries, a couple of steel plates, and the toes of fusion of my right hand and wrist, I was retired at the age of 33. Oh, wow. About eight years later, I began pursuing a Korean broadcasting. In the early days that we had visited the podcasting and fell in love with it. Went to a station where I got to buy my time and did a show. Then went to broadcasting school at night, and I've been in full-time radio, FM Music DJ, and in 2017, I launched a podcast.

3:04We got approached by radio stations at, and we converted to radio show. We did. It's now syndicated broadcast once a week, and then it goes online as a podcast each episode. It's a top podcast worldwide. I love what I do, and I love providing a platform for not just law enforcement officers to tell their stories, but you're giving a glimpse behind the badge, but also victims of crime, military, other first responders, other law enforcement officers of family and members, our survivors talking about trauma they went through, how it impacted their lives, and what they did about the new lives afterwards, and most of them, their trauma has been impacted and caused by violent crime, and there are some very inspiring stories. Yes, that's so true, and I don't think people realized they'll read a headline, and oh, so-and-so was killed. The ripple effect is tremendous, and I don't think anybody out here where I, you know, my friends, my circle of influence, I don't think anybody's not experienced something like

4:08this, and it's just, what do you do? How do you handle that every day? I know you cover the whole nation when there's a tragedy. How do you handle that every day? Well, first of all, I tell people that, you know, I'm just a street cop. I don't, I'm not a psychiatrist, I'm not a psychologist, I'm not a therapist. I just try to stay in my lane and tell people, in the very little of the shows about me and what I've been through, but when I do, when it adds to the conversation, I tell people what I went through, how it impacted me, and the choices I had to make to find a way to build a better life in spite of what happened. You know, these things happen to everybody, like you said, they happen to everyone and the ripple effect, and the community is tremendous, but we're given a choice. We can't undo the past, what we can do is say, okay, how can I change the future for me, for my family, my loved ones, and then hopefully for my community to make a positive impact? That's what I try to focus on.

5:09Yeah, and I don't think people realize when you're in a situation like that, you have a nanosecond to make a decision. And there are so many Monday night quarterbacks, you know, saying, oh, I would do this or I would do that. You don't know what you're going to do until you're in the situation. And I'm very, I'm very rude about it. I tell people, you don't know you weren't there, you know, say that easily from where you're at, the safety of your keyboard, where there's no threat, or the biggest threat is a rusty paperclip. It sees you said then done. Oh, absolutely. So how do you feel about the attitude towards law enforcement, and this is like even two years ago that everything has changed? Well, first, you know, I would love to tell you that I think it's new, it's dramatic, it's getting a lot of coverage. We have, you know, from my early days in policing, we didn't have 24 hour, seven day a week, cable television news channels. And we didn't have social media was being flooding these stories.

6:10But there was very much negative anti-police climate going on that left over from the 70s from the Vietnam War era. People need to look at their history and see how many people, how many police officers have been killed and mutilated and by murderers, by criminals, by terrorists in the 60s and 70s, the numbers staggering. So what's, it's not new, what is new is that we're constantly being bombarded with it. We don't hear all the great things that the cops do. We don't hear all the great things they do daily. We don't hear about all the positive interactions they have in community under horrible situations. What we hear is negative, negative, negative. And here's an example, I come up with, you can have a professional athlete who starts and will take a knee during a national anthem. They get front page publicity and sponsorship. But you have someone who feeds thousands of people every day and no one knows about them. Right. No one.

7:11Right. It's so true. Everybody wants to focus on the wrong things, is my opinion. Yeah, that's why we do this show because we want people to know we've got some amazing law enforcement personnel out there and we need to support them. Their job is dangerous. In military, I can tell you, I'm honorary commander at Davis Mountain and one of my people stopped at the grocery store to pick up some diapers on his way home and some lady came up and spit on them because of his uniform. And he has to not engage because he's been in this uniform, you cannot engage. You know, you don't want to cause a scene. This is unacceptable and this happened just a few months back. This is unacceptable. People need to be more respectful of law enforcement of the uniform. I just don't know what's in people's heads anymore. It's become fashionable to do that. People think they're making a statement and they're raising awareness.

8:13You know, I'm a product of the Vietnam War era. I grew up in Norfolk, Virginia and a lot of the kids I went to school with. Their fathers were POWs or missing an action and they spent seven, eight years in these facilities and they came home and I remember how they're treated when they came home. And the same treatment is happening with our law enforcement officers today and to some respect, other first responders and military as well. Yeah, absolutely and I just don't get it. I don't understand where they raised by wolves. It just doesn't make sense to me. What do you think is going to happen with this case up in Minnesota? Is he going to get a retrial? You know, that's a decision that the legal experts have to make. You know, I was always taught early on that as a police officer, when you want to have an arrest someone, you build the best case you have with what's available at the time with the evidence. And there's no counting for what curries do.

9:14There's really no, there's only intricacies that are created by the legal system that you don't have a lot of impact on it. All you can do is the best job you can. Will he get a retrial? I don't know. And you know, I've learned this a long time ago, never bet on what a judge or jury is going to do ever, ever, ever. It could be a lock solid case and actually know they're not guilty. Yeah, that's so true. I've seen a lot of cases like that. I just feel that, you know, I didn't have the time to sit and watch the whole trial, but I was home when they did part of the closing arguments. And that was the first time I saw the video of what led up to the person being on the ground. And I thought, why didn't we see that part all these weeks before, instead of just watching, you know, somebody kneeling on somebody, I put a whole different perspective on the situation for me, but I'm just one person and I'm not on the jury.

10:18We had a philosophy in Baltimore and it still holds true is, and this referred to the newspaper, the Baltimore Sun in particular, if it bleeds, it bleeds. And that the more gore, the more shocked that they can deliver, the more eyeballs to get on their product, the more advertisers see the more the revenue they can generate. It's a revenue thing. And you know, you know, both in radio and we're about trying to get more listeners. We want to be honest and have authentic product and de-authentic people and do we stand by and stand for, but if you can't get an audience, it doesn't really matter. So when these other people news media, they're going to put out what's going to attract a lot of attention and a shock factor is what gets everything out there. Without saying whether I believe or agree whether he should have been a wrestler or not, I am not shocked ever that any media outlet puts out a video that is edited, that is shortened

11:20and deliberately manufactured and presented a way that creates the most shocked factor gets most eyeballs on their product, period. And it starts a conversation and not necessarily the right one. Yeah. It doesn't really matter if it's the right one or even a fair one or just one, it's about making money. It's the whole way with the news media, people, we've had court case after court case. They're not required to tell us facts or the truth. Their job is to generate revenue for their shareholders and their advertisers. That's their job. Even if they're spewing untruths, unfortunately. And they do, yeah, they do do that. So during your career, how did people treat you? Of all the radio stations in the United States, there are no other shows like the Law Enforcement Talk radio show on Facebook, there's only one official page. Do a search on Facebook for the Law Enforcement Talk radio show and be sure to like the Law Enforcement

12:22Talk radio show, Facebook page. I know it was decades earlier, but how did people treat you? Did you get the respect of like school kids? This is something I'm finding really remarkable. There's short answers, no, it depends on the individual and the situation. I'll very quickly tell people in my career, I was in four shootings and a little less than 11 years, like 10 years in change. And the first two, I never fired a shot back because immediately, I knew the threat was over. The second two were dramatically different, everybody survived. And not one of those people, not one of them shot at me because I was a white officer. They all shot at me because they're trying to avoid apprehension. However, if I shoot back, it's automatically about race. Of course. And there are conclusions made based on the way people look and not based on the facts.

13:26So as an incredibly violent situation, a lot of violence, most of it was directed towards family members and victims of crimes in our community that we served and it's horrifying to see. Yeah, and that's something we're experiencing here in Arizona. We have homicides are up just in Tucson and Pima County, homicides are up like three times, four times more, what they were over a year ago. And I'm just like, what's matter with people? What's this world coming to? Everybody's out buying guns and shooting people up because they're angry. And then the news says, well, they had a mental problem. Well, no kidding. Who doesn't have a mental problem and who doesn't have an angry issue? I laugh when people tell me, you don't understand. I'm angry. Oh, yeah. Like I haven't been angry in my life and I don't want to talk about for a day, I'm talking about for years. Oh, yeah. When I get angry, I don't go breaking into department stores, looting them until they're

14:26empty and then torching them. That's not, you know, how you handle the situation. My conjan is sitting in the control room going, you don't? Why not? Yeah. Yeah. No, it's, it's just a whole different ball game. And honestly, you know, there's a lot of politicians out there that I, some of them I respect, some I don't, but I don't think when Jan Lewis was talking to people just before he passed that he meant to do things like what's going on now. It's just, it's senseless. So what do you think about the gun situation? What do you think they're going to do with it? Well, it, again, it's, the thing about politics is you have to create an environment where I'll put you this way. The best movies are the ones about the bogeyman. So they create someone who was a threat that or a something that is a threat and they are the solution for the threat. So guns, they keep telling you are the problem.

15:26It's not guns that are probably want more gun control. How about some criminal control? How about we take people that have 10, 15 prior arrested and convicted multiple times from filing crimes and put them in jail and leave them there armed with their population. These guns that are being used in crimes, the vast majority are not being committed by law-biting citizens or even legally purchased guns. They're by guns that are stolen, robberies, burglaries or whatever else. It's done by criminals. Let's lock them up. Why do you think they're not doing that? I've said it before. Let's do something about this. These people shouldn't have these guns. Why are they selling guns to people who have mental problems? I don't know that they are. Even in say I'm in Florida, last time I bought a gun and I'm not a gun guy to be honest with you. I never had a gun in my life until I became a cop. So I have a couple.

16:27But even being a retired police, there's a seven-day wait, seven to ten days to develop a purchase, a handgun. You've got to go through the requirements there, but I don't know where they come up with this stuff from. But part of it is if someone has a mental problem, the hippo laws do not allow some of that information to be released. How are they going to get access to it? Number one. If the person filling out the paperwork to buy this rifle or this gun doesn't let out they've been treated for schizophrenia voluntarily, how are they going to find out? Right. Oh, by the way, I'm a sociopath. They're not going to say that. Those people don't exactly tell people, yeah, by the way, I'm a sociopath. I hear voices like the son of Sam that tell me I want to kill people. They don't tell you that. True that. But I still think that, you know, and they'll say, oh, it was spare of the moment. Somebody just, you know, got angry and it's spare of the moment they killed somebody.

17:28If you have to wait seven days, ten days to get a permit, and this is what you're doing to, you know, shoot somebody with this gun that you're buying, that's premeditated murder. That's not, oh, spare of the moment. Right. And the big thing is that we're taught that when it comes to violent crime, you got to have the means, the motive and the opportunity to commit that crime. So the opportunity is, okay, there's no cops around, so I'm going to go kill Joe Blow. The motive, I'm killing him because he was messing around with my wife or whatever might be or he owes me money. The means is at least important. I use a gun, a knife, a car, a bomb, whatever might be. People focus on the means all the time, set of the opportunity and the motive. You can't put more emphasis on one saying the gun is the issue. Look at United Kingdom. Knife crimes are skyrocketing. Gun crime is very, very low. Here in the United States, does it really matter if a person was shot, stabbed, bludgeoned

18:33with a baseball bag or whatever? If they're killed, they're killed. Yeah, dead is dead. You're not coming back. No. You know, they're poisoning people. I was watching you show the other day and I said, yeah, this is your poison of choice. And I'm like, wait a minute, what? But yeah, people will find a way if they are, they're set on doing something. They will find the way and you're right. They'll go out and buy illegal guns. They're everywhere. And yeah, you don't need a permit for that. I don't know, I don't know how they could even begin to control anything like that. Well, a lot of these people have to go back to what I said earlier. A lot of these people that commit these violent crimes in there. You know, there's in the prison population, in my experience, there's a percentage of people that have one bad moment in their life. There was another large percentage of people, the boys and the drugs are alcohol. They never do the things they did in one of the prison. They're so responsible of what they did. Then you have the career criminals.

19:34The career criminals that go out and purchase these guns illegally. It's not the first time they've done this. Many of them have been arrested multiple times and given, I'll give you a case in Texas. A guy is a convicted cell and he's out on parole. He's on parole and he's arrested for murder and what's the judge do? Give some bond and let some walk. He's a parole lead. He's already proven he can't be trusted in society and he did it again. And yet, we let him back down the streets. We can harm more people. That doesn't make sense logically. That happened in New York, the man that was beating up on the little Asian lady. He was proled and he was a murderer and they let him go. One of the questions I get all the time is how can I show my support for a law enforcement? We're all busy. Not busy lives, but there's something oh so simple you can do with our Facebook page.

20:37Search for law enforcement talk, radio show, Facebook page. And when you see a post you agree with that resonates with you, share it, especially episodes of the podcast. To do all that, just search for us on Facebook, look for law enforcement talk, radio show and be sure to click like. So we've got a call around the line, Charles, what's on your mind? Well, I wanted to bring something up in terms of guns and I'm sorry, your guest's name again is please, Mr. Wiley is it? Jay Wiley. Jay Wiley, Mr. Wiley, thank you for your reasonable attitude and you're trying to broaden the scope and talking about dealing with violence, not just with the method of violence. I think it's a message it doesn't get out there often enough, it gets overridden by emotion, especially in the media. But I'm sharing, just because a person has mental problems does not just qualify them

21:42from gun ownership, only if they've been institutionalized against their will. And those records are available, even Kippa notwithstanding those records, especially if it's done by a court, those records are public. And so it is possible if we fix the system and require a reporting to that to get people who are mentally disabled from owning a gun to make it so they can't buy one from a dealer. But just because they have schizophrenia alone, unless they've been institutionalized for it, doesn't prohibit them from owning a gun. And here's why. What you're doing basically is you're saying, if you're saying, well, if you've gotten schizophrenia, you can't defend yourself. What you're then doing is you're discriminating against the handicapped. Mr. Wily, I'd love your comment on that. I agree with you 185%, and the other thing that a lot of people don't realize, I tell people

22:43a time, don't answer yes to people's preconceived stereotypes. Schizophrenia, everybody's got schizophrenia, isn't a threat. Somebody's got some sort of mental illness, is not a threat and not always violent. And even people who are narcissistic and sociopaths, they're not always violent. Some of them are elected politicians and are very good at what they do, because of that, that skill set. And some of them are in the legal profession. So if someone has, in a great example, is post-traumatic stress. Everybody that has PTSD or injury, I forgot to call it, is not a threat of violence to people, but Hollywood puts out that image and everyone believes that's a case. And that's what the media runs with. So you could have all these people that have mental illnesses and have weapons, and they're no threat to anybody, and they're your next door neighbor. I mean, they've never been a threat to anybody. And they don't, they don't go out of the way to make life miserable for anyone. They just want to have a happy life.

23:43That's true. That's a right to defend themselves, especially if they're disabled. I teach the concealed weapons permit class, and I've been doing that for 27 years. And I have certified, in my time, free-blind people. And when people who are anti-freedom about guns hear that, they go nuts. Why would you want a blind person to have a gun? The same reason I want them to have a car. No, maybe. But if you listen to, it doesn't mean they can't own the car, it means that they can't drive it. But the point is, a blind person is at a greater risk of attack than a person with sight. So what you're saying is because the person has a disability, they can't defend themselves, that is open and notorious discrimination. Now you change the ammunition the person shoots, so it won't go as far. Okay, you put ammo in their gun that has less likelihood of injuring innocent people. But if a person attacks a blind person, they're going to be a hand distance.

24:47Why wouldn't you use a gun? And some people just don't think that way. They think that somehow because a person's blind, they have a handicap that you should discriminate against them, and that's horrible. That's why you have laws against discrimination. That's true. When people apply for certain types of weapons and certain types of ammo, they should be able to sign something that says, I give up my HIPAA rights. You can find out that I'm a normal person. I've never been, you know, put in the funny farm or anything. I'm not distressed. I'm not. I'm not happy. You cannot, there's a principle in law that you cannot force someone to give up a right to gain another one. Sure. And also remembering Arizona, there is no licensing that's required. It's against the law in Arizona to force a person to register a gun except a machine gun or a silencer or a short barrel rifle or short barrel shotgun. But other than that, and that's a national registration, not a local one, it is against

25:48the law in Arizona to force a person to register a gun, and that's good. The government has no business knowing what non-criminal citizens own. Okay. Okay. I'd love to hear your answer on the air. Thank you. He's preaching to the choir, if you ask me, because I agree to them 100%. You know? And again, every say it's different, but I have a rock-wilder. We've had rock-wilder dogs for 20 years, 20, my wife and I were 25 years. The state will issue licensing and they want to know a breed you have, so they can be classified as either an aggressive dog or a non-aggressive dog based on their breed. I don't believe they have a right to know what kind of three-family member I have. I don't believe the government has a right to know and demand how many glocks I have or what 12-gauge shotgun I own. That's really another business because I don't walk around and I don't create problems

26:48for people. I'm never been arrested nor will I ever plan on getting arrested. But all these laws they pass, guess who they target. They target people. They want to create a whole new class of felons for a lack of better words that have never committed a crime in their lives because all of a sudden some legislations have been passed. This says you are now criminal. Meanwhile, they ignore the violent criminals, the walker streets and they go so far as to put them right back out there. Yeah, and they have and they don't reform them and they're in prison, so they're out there doing what they did when they originally went to prison. They're just better at it now. So we're going to take a quick break, Jay, stay with us, please. Get access to free podcast versions of the show and more on Facebook. Do a search for the Law Enforcement Talk Readout Show and be sure to click like.

27:48Thanks for staying with us. Our guest today is Jay Wiley from Law Enforcement out of Florida. Are you in Florida or are you in Baltimore? I'm in Palm Beach County, Florida. Oh, so it's pretty nice down there. Yeah, it's I had to get away from Baltimore. It's just that it had too much violence for me. I did my time. I want peaceball. Really do. Yeah, I hear you. That would be nice. There are certain parts of Tucson. I will not go to after dark and it's really too bad this day times, maybe, but definitely not after dark. So tell me about the area that you live in. Does the police department have like an explorer program where they can engage kids to, you know, start doing the right thing before they start doing the wrong thing? Well, the biggest agency here in Palm Beach County is Palm Beach County Sheriff's Office and they have a huge area to cover. And then the different jurisdictions inside the county have their police department, West

28:52Palm Beach, Palm Beach itself, Point and Beach Del Rey, a few other ones. And most of them have an explorer program or police cadets program and it's and all of them have been heavily involved and this is something that's going on in 1980 in Baltimore. They're heavily involved in community relations and very much thoughtful about and deliberate and approach about we want to be part of community as soon as part of community. And that goes back to conversation we had earlier where that kind of stuff's not reported. They'd rather use terms like they're an occupying force and all this other nonsense is just not true. But they've been heavily involved and I'm pretty sure PBSO has a very extensive cadets or law enforcement stores program. There was a situation where people are becoming offended because law enforcement looked very military like when they come in to do whatever their job is and they were talking about let's

29:52change their uniform, let's kind of dumb it down, I guess. How do you feel about that? I'm just appalled that they would think the bad guys are going to have better equipment than the good guys and you want to strip them of his gear. By the way, it looks matter as far as people concerned, it doesn't matter what you do. Again, I'll go back to my part experience. It doesn't matter what you do, it depends on how you look. So if they think a uniform is going to make a difference, have they looked at the violent crime that goes on our communities, have they seen what they're up against? You said earlier, Sherry Goodpoint, there's parts of your city Tucson, which by the way is a lovely city I was there many years ago. You won't go to it at night, but your police have to go there. Sherry's department has to go there every time there's a call for service. They don't have an option. So if they got soft body armor on and it's exterior body armor, which by the way saves a lot of people's backs and makes you a little uncomfortable, get over it, take a look

30:54at what they're going up against. Yeah, you're dealing with the kind of people that you need to be prepared. I mean, really prepared. And taking their body armor away or taking their guns away and giving them a baton, you know, this defund the police. I know some areas have done that. Has anything like that happened in Florida? No, I am in Florida. There may be some pockets of that, particularly further up north of Randall or Lando, but it's not been an issue here in areas where they have done it. A mile of departments, Baltimore. I think they funded, even though they see at the number one or number two, most violent city, United States. They defunded their police by about 20 million and, secretly, they turn around and we funded them by an additional 8 million. So they went from 20 million deficit to 28 million additional funds. And they're about 500 officers short, where we figure out with, in the district with 20

31:56or 25 officers, they're going out with seven. This is one of the deadly cities in the United States. So you can't make it, we can train these people, hire people, get the best of the best out there. Guess who's going to suffer? It's not going to be people in the United communities on the energy of that. Yeah. Absolutely. And I think this is something that's all across the board in America. We are not fully staffed as far as police is concerned. Some areas are at critical levels. And I know Tucson is not staffed the way they would like to be staff. And they're having a very difficult time finding qualified people recruits. So where do you go to get these good people? I know there's good people out there to say, hey, come on in, join our department. People aren't going to like you. You might get spit on or shot at, but hey, it's, it's a good job. Come on. Join our department. Well, first of all, they've got to, number one, people that go in the law enforcement

33:00now. Most of them have a college education and some degree and other. A lot of them are military veterans, many of them speak multiple languages. They bring many skill sets to the table that are very much sought after in our communities. And by the way, when I call 911 because I have a medical emergency in my home, I want the very best possible to show up and more likely it's going to be law enforcement first because there's more, they're more mobile, the easy closer. So I want them, I want the best ones showing up. These people have more options now. So if they have a choice of making $40,000 a year where they can get sued, then by the way, immunity from prosecution is taken away or I'm pretty familiar looking for, they can be held simply liable for what they're trained to do. They can get arrested. They can get killed that they can get permanently injured and maimed. And by the way, your entire department and city will attack you. They're not going to take that job for $40,000.

34:01When they can get another job, it's $45,000 and it's a lot safer. And by the way, having the nights and weekends off. Yeah, almost a normal job. It's amazing when I hear these different agencies come on and they're struggling to recruit people and it used to be a job where people wanted to be the good guy. We need more good guys out there, definitely. I think there's a lot of people out there that really still want to do this job and it's a calling, it's a vocation. As many people that are so good at what they do and their community service and the reason they care that gone is when people attack them so they can save their life or the life of someone else. It's not to go gun people down, but when these people really want to do this job, they've got families to take care of. They've got other obligations to take care of. And maybe they're getting the former saying, it's just not worth it to risk all that. When my wife or my husband and my kids, they're the ones who are going to have to pay the price.

35:02When I'm killed, they're the ones who are going to be left alone or worse yet, when I'm physically disabled and mean for the rest of my life, they're going to help take care of me and we're going to make a lot less, which is happening at alarming rates in every party in the United States. And with some of the situations that have happened over the last year or so, I think it's trialed by media and people are badmouthing law enforcement when they go after people. What was it? It's 12-year-olds running around at 2.30 in the morning with a gun and he got shot. He didn't put the gun down or he just dropped it when he got shot. What is your 12-year-old doing out at 2.30 in the morning? Waving a gun. People will let me tell you that this is my sarcasm coming out and I apologize and advance. People will tell you it takes a village. Yeah, and it's something to agree it does, but it also takes the parent. One good parent that's involved in their child's life, and if you have two great, if you

36:04have aunts and uncles and neighbors that care about the kid, they're not going to tolerate that nonsense. No, they're not. You know, nothing good was coming out of that situation. And most of the situations that have come into the media have involved illegal weapons, drugs, people are on drugs, felony warrants, they're trying to, you know, take a felon off the street and they get combative and end up, you know, getting injured or permanently injured. Basically, that's what happened to me. I was 33 years old and like I said, I thought I knew in this incident, Sherry, that this guy was trying to kill me. I came to this conclusion, this guy is trying to kill me. And the first thing in my mind was, I'm going to die, but it's not going to be tonight. It's not going to be because of him. I'm going to do whatever case to survive. But I thought I'd spray my wrist and I was 33 married, had two children, mortgage, everyone wanted his life. And within a matter of months, my pay was three quarters of what it was before and I was

37:07on the way out and my career was over. And it happens in a flash. Did you watch the Capitol Police testifying this past week? I did not. I don't watch a lot of those things and the reason why is, I get too upset. First of all, it hits things in me that brings up memories of things that have passed and it's a physical, physical response, so I don't watch them. Now those, all those police are going to be, for the rest of their lives, be affected by what happened on January 6th. And their families, their families, and people don't think about it. If you're married to a law enforcement or a military, your family is also a part of that department because, you know, what did your wife go through when you were shot? Yeah, well, I tell people, I wish that we had some of the tools now that we've developed and now back then.

38:08You know, my first marriage ended because of, I didn't handle it better and you're absolutely right. There's a positive, there's definitely impacts that's going to happen on the family members and they're going to get impacted. My daughters are impacted and they're in their 30s of granted, it's not part of their daily life anymore, but they certainly paid a price and they were very young when it's happened. We have got to get better at having conversations with ourselves, our law enforcement community, our firefighters, our EMTs, our collections officers, dispatchers. They're all paying a heavy price to try to make our lives safer. And it's being driven by politics and politicians and people trying to create, do you need to be afraid? There's an old saying from movie, the greatest trick ever played is when the devil commits the world he didn't exist. Well, that's been replaced by the biggest trick in the world is convincing that police are the enemy and not 1% outlaw motorcycle gangs and MS-13 and the mafia or anybody else.

39:11You get to be afraid of the police. That's preposterous. That is, absolutely is. But that's, you know, the media is out there and it's not just the media, the news media. I was watching, and I talked about this on the show before, I was watching the news media. They were reporting an officer involved shooting and the reporter said the, the racist policeman went after this kid who had a felony warrant out and shot him because he was black. Not the fact that the kid was shooting at him and they were exchanging fire and the kid started it and he had a felony warrant, you know, the racist police, one after him. I'm like, what are you, what are you doing? This isn't reporting. You're not being, you know, this is very bias. It's, it's about a opinion and speculate. Most of what passes at news nowadays, and again, you know, I both work in radio. Most of what passes for news nowadays, especially in the morning shows, is opinion and speculation

40:16and they bring in so-called experts and I'm thinking half the time, what are you even talking about? I don't know if these people even know a clue what they're talking about. And that's what a lot of our news reporters are. Some states are changing as a police officer, in many states, you're a public official and people say whatever they want. As long as there's some basis and truth to it, you're pretty much open game. Now that I'm retired, if someone comes out to me and calls me those sort of things, they can expect to be in court, they're going to get sued. Yeah. And people need to stop doing that and just report what's happening. We call them the talking heads, you know, what did the talking heads say today? Yeah, exactly, exactly. You know, and you're right, it's basically their opinion. They're not trying to get the truth out there. And this is something that we try to do, you and I both. And I think we're both of the same generation. I had a lot of friends in Vietnam. And, you know, when they came back, it was pretty horrific.

41:17I was appalled because my mom and dad were both in the Marine Corps during World War II. So I was raised differently. I was raised to respect the military, respect police. And people don't raise their kids like that anymore. And unfortunately, some don't and that's going back to that. Hey, I don't have to take care of my kid and raise them. The idiots, I'm sorry, the village will do it. So I don't have to do it. There's a lot of the leaders in the village or idiots. Yeah. Oh, yeah. And this whole thing with COVID thing. How's COVID affected you and your family? Are you okay? Everybody's good. My wife and I got vaccinated probably about four or five months ago, because, you know, we're, I'm in my early 60s. And I'm never worried about it. I tell people, this whole six feet apart, I prefer 21 feet apart. And look, it's right in my alley. Go to the radio station. I do my job, then I go home and I'll be around people.

42:19But it's like perfect environment for me. I like it. So we got the shots because we want to be able to travel. And people are entitled to their opinions. You know, I just not, I don't engage them. If they want to argue about it, they'll have at it. I got all the things to do. Yeah, I was vaccinated too and same, same. I've got other things to do. And the politics of this whole COVID thing is just blows my mind. You know, I'm not going to go to my precinct captain to find out what I need for my sore throat. I'm just, it doesn't work that way. So listen to your doctors, listen to the scientists. That's the best thing you can do. And use your head. At common sense, you know, I wear my seat belt when I drive a car because I've never seen a professional race car driver drive without one. When I was a police officer, always wore a soft body armor because there was ingrained in me. So getting the vaccination was not a big deal.

43:19I've been, as a kid, I was vaccinated against everything. I probably, like you, I had a scar on my arm. We had every population in the world, known to mankind we had. And I'm fine. So getting this thing, but when people get on TV and they love to talk about it and cope with this, cope with that, we need to do this, we need to do that. I'm like, yeah, you need to, you need to shut up. Yeah, it's on the news. People are protesting, wear a mask. People are protesting. Don't wear a mask. Mine think and get a life. Exactly. What's that thing to do? Sherry, I'm busy. You're busy, aren't you busy? I'm terribly busy. I don't have time for that. But I remember when I was in grade school, the nuns would line us up and everybody got a shot in school. Yeah. You know, no questions asked. It's a done deal. And I have the scars to prove it. I can go back and we're obviously the same age group. I grew up in North Virginia, big military town. And one of the drills we had was the fire drill.

44:20Everybody knew that in elementary school. But the other one we had was a nuclear bomb drill where they sound the alarm and we had to get on our desk. And we were convinced, because this is what the government told us, hey, this will keep you safe. Getting under a little desk is not going to save your life. A nuclear bomb has dropped on your school. It's just not going to make a difference. Yet, we did it anyway. So people get too occupied in what the talking head say, you should or shouldn't do. And they peppered with their opinion. Oh, and they're elitist. I'll look down in here because you're stupid if you don't agree in any type of attitude. Well, I found out later on in life, that desk in those drills did nothing and never would have done anything. But it was nice to make this feel like we were putting a bandaid on the bleed, you know what I mean? Air raid trails. I remember them. And we had the blackout trails, too. And then it was replaced with tornado drills. Yeah. It's like we were drilled all over the place. Yeah. Golden and given shots. And given shots. Stand there. Don't move.

45:22So yeah, that's a different time now. People, people are there's a group. People who want their kids to get vaccinated in another group that says no way. It's just crazy. I think the world's just going crazy. Yeah, my daughter said they're in her early 30s and they both have been vaccinated. That's their choice. And they get to decide what they want to do. If I had thought of the parent of a five-year-old, a six-year-old right now, I think my minds they'd be totally different. And again, I go back to people who are entitled their opinions and they're pointing to you, their perspective, their perspective is their reality. It doesn't mean it has to match their facts. So it's not just about this, it's about anything. When people start spouting off, the more emotional they are about something, quite often it's run by their perspective, their experience, and who might have told them their wrong. All I can do is, hey, not be part of the problem, be part of the solution. And when you're listening to the news, switch it up. Listen to all the stations. Don't just focus in on one station

46:23because after a while you've got their perspective, whether it's liberal or it's conservative, whatever it is, you've been, it's kind of like a brainwashing. It's, you know, that's your perspective and that's what you believe. And then there's a lot of propaganda out there all over the place, so you need to consider the source, too. Yeah, and people, they ask me, one of the greatest problems I've had working in radio is, if you'll say, you know, I don't know if you're conservative or liberal or what you are, I might thank you. That's the whole point because when I do a radio show, especially music, radio show, it's not about me, it's about my audience and it's about my guests. I mean, sure they get what they need, like you're doing. We have a conversation. And what I believe, what my thoughts and what my opinions are, really don't matter. Experience is what people really want to hear about. Yeah, it's true. And we try to get the good news out there.

47:23Not that everybody wants to hear it, but we do everyone's and well. We'll get an agency call and say, hey, we've got somebody want to brag about. We've got a segment we call, above and beyond the badge. And you can see it on our website, lawmatters1030.org. And we've got some really exceptional law enforcement people out there who do things they don't need to do. They can go to work and go home and, you know, not be bothered to collect the paycheck, but these people are invested in their community and they really want to help people. And like you said, it's a vocation. You want to be a part of the community and part of making it better. That's why people get into law enforcement in the military. And we need more people like that all across the country. Absolutely. And a lot of big things happening in departments is what they call laterals. They'll pick people who are experienced police or other agencies and give them a job at a higher rate of pay for them to train them. I had a guest on the show, Sheriff's Department in Maryland.

48:26And he said it cost them on average, I think $120,000 to get one deputy on the street between all the people that don't wash out, that don't make it to the academy, wherever it might be. That's the cost. And then many of them are leaving within three years. So the retention problem on top of that is huge. So what they're doing is they're going for the best of, the safe Tucson is doing laterals for the county guys that have 10 years on the job. The rest of the guys that means men and women, they're getting the best of the best and they're taken from other agencies because everybody is in this race to try to get and fill the positions they need because our communities need these people. Yes, they do. And you say it takes a village. It does take a village. And I remember when I was little, there was a Bobby on the beat. People would know who the law of law enforcement officer was, John was our officer, John.

49:29He was our policeman in our neighborhood. He walked the neighborhood, he talked to people, he shook hands, he played catch with the kids. You don't see that anymore, not a lot. Periodically you'll see it, but not a lot. And they don't have manpower to do that. They don't have the manpower to actually, we were told that they are not pulling speeders over anymore, they're not giving out tickets because they don't have the people to do that. They are responding to calls. They don't have people just patrolling and it makes a big difference. I remember, I first post him and Baltimore, my sergeant said to me, but pull someone up and pull you up and point to somebody. You know who the name is, you know where the lab, you know where the good guy or bad guy, you know who the parents are. You're not doing your job. Your job is to handle calls for service and be a fixed insurance community. And you knew you arrived when the people in the community gave you a nickname. And that was, you became part of,

50:30you got invited to the backyard barbecues. And of course, you were also there when people took their last breaths when they got shot. So you're on all sides of it. And when you have encounters of people, it's usually because they're having a really, really bad moment. So it really helps if they know someone, but we don't have enough people to fill those positions in the hand of calls for service. You're gonna lose that aspect of what we call community policing now. It was what we did all the time. It was everyday policing. And I was taught that by Vietnam veterans. And I was taught that by even some Korean war veterans or commanders, it's about being respect and about giving it and getting it and being an integral part of the community and helping solve people's problems. Yeah, and I think that's the big thing is respecting the people in your community and they'll respect you back and treating everybody right. If we can do that, what was your nickname, Jay? I've had many. My first one was Bigfoot, because I wear a size 13 shoe. And then remember deep throat

51:31from the Watergate days of a deep voice, they called me deep throat after that. Okay, give me some words of wisdom for our listeners and people who were thinking about getting into law enforcement or the military. Listen, if you want to get into it, I would tell people, get into the military when you're young. I didn't do that. I was stupid. I stayed home, had many jobs. Go somewhere, learn something. And if you're interested in Korean law enforcement, get it and go for it. But one time I tell people is you have a dentist, you see every year, you have a general position, positions every year. If you're going into law enforcement, make sure you have a psychologist, a psychiatrist that is skilled in trauma, you see once a year on your own so that you can do the proactive work to prevent any time long-term mental injuries. But it's a great career and I highly recommend it. That's really sound advice, because you're going to benefit from it.

52:31So will your family, because so many times people don't, they take the work home. And either they talk about it or they don't. And if it's bottled up, you're not getting the help you need. Jay, I want to thank you so much for coming on the show. You're an absolute scholar. I love you. Thanks, Sherry. Pleasure. OK, until next week, I want everybody to shop local, stay safe, and stay out of the wash. The law enforcement talk, Riddah Show, is a nationally syndicated weekly radio show, broadcast on numerous AM and FM radio stations across the country. We're always adding more affiliate stations. If you enjoyed the podcast version of the show, which is always free, please do me a favor and tell a friend, or two, or three. I'll be back in just a few days with another episode of the law enforcement talk, Riddah Show, and podcast. Until then, this is John J. Wiley. See ya.