Street Warrior

by Ralph Friedman

  A board, about twelve feet in length and a foot wide, was lying invitingly on our roof against the stairwell kiosk.

  Timmy and I looked at each other, the unspoken words between us saying, “Do we dare try it?”

  “Fuck it!” we both said almost in unison and grabbed the plank, placing it between the two roofs.

  It seemed sturdy enough and might have been used in the past to make a hasty escape, then pulled out of the way. Why else would it be on the roof to begin with? I was trying to talk myself into making the crossing. I’m sure the same thoughts were going through Timmy’s mind. We didn’t have any time to hesitate or our targets would be back on the street or, worst-case scenario, gone.

  I went first, shimmying across the narrow piece of wood as quickly as possible. It sagged a bit under my weight but held up just fine. When I got to the other side, Timmy mounted the plank. He was a few pounds lighter than me and, unless a sudden gust of wind blew him into that big precinct in the sky, he’d make it too. He did.

  We hustled down the stairs and found our guys on the third-floor landing. They looked at us coming down the stairs and their eyes bulged.

  Guns out, Timmy said. “Don’t move a fucking muscle.” They complied.

  I had confused their reaction with being resigned that we had caught them with their supply, but it turned out to be a look of shock at lengths we were going to in order to nab them.

  They were clean. Again.

  We handcuffed them as we thought about what to do next.

  Timmy and I backed off and talked strategy, which basically amounted to a lot of head scratching and cursing. Meanwhile our prisoners got ballsy and started wisecracking, calling us names and saying all sorts of things about our mothers.

  Do you beat them up and call it street justice? But street guys can take beatings; they’d be back on the street in wheelchairs hawking their goods. Timmy and I came up with something better (or worse, depending on how you look at it).

  We removed the cuffs. Thinking they were in the clear, they took their first steps to freedom. We stopped them.

  “You’re not going anywhere,” I said.

  They exchanged glances, confused. “What the fuck?” one of them said.

  “Take off your clothes,” Timmy said.

  They were speechless. Timmy repeated the order. They stripped to their underwear, protesting steadily that they didn’t have any drugs.

  “This isn’t a search,” I said. “It’s a lesson. Now take the rest off.”

  They looked at each other but complied. They stood buck naked in the tenement hallway trying to cover themselves.

  “Okay,” I said, “you can go now.”

  They both reached for their clothes.

  “Without the clothes!” Timmy bellowed.

  They begged, cajoled, and promised never to return to the area if we’d let them get dressed.

  “Everything stays here,” I said. “If we see you even walking through this neighborhood again, this is the least that’ll happen.” The last we saw of the two dealers they were running down the block to the shouts and jeers of the people on the street. We knew they would never return to the area. They were too macho.

  Sometimes things happened this way back then. Today this would never happen, and I’m sure some readers may not believe it ever happened. Let me assure you, it did, and similar incidents occurred quite often. The thinking was that sometimes justice takes many different forms; sticking to the letter of the law often doesn’t work. Cops wanted to rid the streets of criminals, and the people from the area where those dealers operated, even the ones who didn’t have very nice things to say about the police in general, applauded our actions.

  * * *

  I’d been a second-grade detective for about two years and I’d begun hearing rumors of a forthcoming promotion to first-grade detective. Within months those rumors took a more solid turn; bosses who knew the system assured me that I’d be promoted by the first of the year, a brief six months away.

  I was ecstatic; after only two years in my current grade, I was getting bumped upward because of my stratospheric number of quality arrests and the numerous medals I’d been awarded over the years, that number now passing two hundred.

  First-grade detective is the pinnacle of any detective’s career. Of the approximately 3,400 detectives in the NYPD at that time, only 115 had attained the rank of first grade.

  I looked forward to the day with anticipation. With only fourteen years on the job, I would happily remain a first-grade detective, with a salary equal to that of a lieutenant, for the rest of my career. All the hard work, stress, injuries, and emotional turmoil was about to pay off.

  Plans, however, sometimes go awry. For me, my hopes and dreams for the future would end not at the hands of a criminal but by simply being in the wrong place at the wrong time while attempting to come to the aid of a fellow police officer.

  10

  Monday, August 1, 1983,

  4 pm-to-1 am tour of duty

  It was a brisk day for August, hovering in the midseventies. The normally scorching month began with a series of thunderstorms that cooled it right down. By late afternoon it was just overcast, the storm clouds drifting off toward Long Island.

  Timmy and I had some arrests to follow up: meeting with complainants, conducting a few interviews. We didn’t expect a busy tour. Mondays are like that. People are partied out from the weekend, and the junkies wouldn’t be on the street to make their buys until close to midnight. But in the Bronx anything can happen and usually does.

  My anticipated promotion to first grade was looming, only I didn’t know exactly when it would come. To my glass-half-full way of thinking “by the first of the year” could be as early as tomorrow.

  I was happy, both because of the looming promotion and because I enjoyed the job. It was nights like these, when things were what passed for quiet in the Bronx, that I had time to reflect on a career that still had a way to go before I would hit retirement age. I was fourteen years in and could retire with a pension after twenty. That would make me forty-one years old, but I knew I’d stay on the job until I was dragged away kicking and screaming at the mandatory retirement age of sixty-two and a half.

  I was by now the most decorated detective in the NYPD’s history, an accomplishment I was proud of. With over two thousand arrests and another four thousand assists, I was more active than any detective in the city. But I was most proud of the cops I’d worked with over the years. No one could ask for better and more lasting friendships than I had.

  I’d been quiet for a while, and Timmy asked if everything was okay.

  “Yeah, man, things are great. Just thinking about the job.”

  “Hard to believe they actually pay us for doing this, right?” Timmy said. We both laughed.

  9:15 PM

  A cop calling a 10-13—officer needs assistance—spewed from the radio in a rush. The officer sounded like he was in serious trouble and needed help desperately.

  Timmy activated the siren, and I stuck a magnetic revolving red flashing light on the roof. Other units from the division responded in a flurry of acknowledgments over the radio. We were off to the scene in a cloud of burnt rubber.

  Timmy was driving. Normally I’d be behind the wheel for the entire tour because I liked to drive and Timmy couldn’t care less, but I’d just gotten back from a motorcycle trip to Virginia Beach and my body was still vibrating from being wrapped around a Harley engine for several days.

  We were hitting speeds up to 75 miles per hour on Bedford Park, heading west and going so fast I had to secure the red light to the roof with my hand.

  Our siren was running at a steady ear-shattering whine. The last thing I remembered was our unit approaching the intersection where Bedford Park meets Jerome Avenue. A Five-Two precinct sector car that was heading south on Jerome to the same call for assistance with siren blaring T-boned us on my side of the car as they shot through the intersection. A rookie male officer was behind
the wheel with a female officer as the recorder. Our sirens had drowned each other out, and neither unit was aware of the other.

  I remember nothing of the impact, its immediate aftermath, or my subsequent removal to North Central Bronx Hospital. Cops who responded to the accident scene would later tell me I was trapped in our car for over two hours. The Fire Department responded and needed the Jaws of Life to get me free of the mangled auto. I was told that cops had crawled into the car to talk to me, keep me awake, and offer support as others fought to disentangle me. I had already gone into shock and would recall none of it.

  I would spend my first week in the hospital unconscious from drugs to reduce the pain. On my first night there, my mother and brother were told that I might not make it through the night. As days passed and it appeared as if I was going to survive, doctors upgraded my condition to I’d probably never walk again.

  Almost immediately I began to get death threats. It seemed like every punk I’d ever arrested wanted me dead. I was totally defenseless, flat on my back in traction, and these brave souls chose that time to threaten me … over the phone, no less. I was placed in a double room, one for me and the other for a contingent of fourteen police officers who guarded me around the clock in shifts.

  When I finally started to come to I was told the extent of my injuries: twenty-three broken bones, including my pelvis, which was broken in four places, and a shattered hip. On the plus side, I didn’t need surgery. The doctors said my superb physical condition and thick muscles cushioned the vital organs and prevented the broken bones from moving and causing further injury. It would take me years to recover and every day of it was trying, but in the beginning it was torturous. The pain was excruciating and unrelenting. Because I was on by back with my leg elevated in traction for seven weeks, I developed bed sores. My veins began to collapse from getting numerous IVs and injections. I was living my worst nightmare.

  I was informed that Timmy had a broken right shoulder, as well as neck and back injuries, two broken fingers on his left hand, and glass in his eyes, with stitches required to repair an eyelid. Police Officer Al Bunis, the driver of the radio car that struck ours, had a large, deep cut to a knee and an almost severed ear. His partner, Officer Cheryl Williams, suffered a broken arm, neck, and back injuries and the loss of her front teeth. When she arrived at the hospital, she had her teeth clutched in her hand, and they were successfully replanted.

  All three officers were treated and released within twelve hours. Timmy Kennedy remained on the job and was eventually promoted to detective by the time he retired, a promotion long overdue. Cheryl Williams also remained on the job and climbed the rank ladder to lieutenant. She’s now retired. Officer Bunis retired after a successful police career. I would never work as a police officer again.

  * * *

  My mother and brother came to see me every day of my hospital stay, all nine weeks of it. The NYPD was very kind throughout. They provided my mother with round-the-clock transportation to and from the hospital; anytime she wanted to visit me, all she had to do was call the local precinct and they’d have a car to her in minutes.

  There was a steady stream of visitors, mostly cops, at all hours, and they never came empty-handed. There was more food in my room than the buffet line at a Howard Johnson’s. The cops there with me would smuggle in everything from Chinese food to lobster. When the doctors and nurses took breaks, they came to my room to eat because the spread far surpassed what they had in their lounges.

  I recall coming out of my drugged stupor after a week and seeing seven women encircling my bed. At first I thought I was hallucinating, but on closer inspection I realized that I’d been dating these women concurrently over the last year and they all picked the same time to visit me. What are the odds? I feigned passing out until they left, thinking I’d have a lot of explaining to do and might wind up with even more broken bones.

  I was dating my current girlfriend, Grace, at the time. I figured she must have a good sense of humor because she didn’t give me any grief over the incident. She may have been the most recent woman in my life, but she was a keeper. Extremely kind and generous—and a knockout—she was at my bedside every day, and as I started walking again she helped me get around. Grace is a unique person, completely selfless and devoted. After thirty-five years, we’re still together and have a beautiful home.

  * * *

  The healing process was hitting a few snags. In addition to my bed sores, I had contracted phlebitis from the IVs. Following that was a bad bout with pneumonia and a staph infection that could’ve killed me. I was on an antibiotic drip six times a day for forty minutes a pop. A doctor from the Centers for Disease Control was assigned to me. Years of treating my body like a temple was paying off. Anyone else would be dead.

  All the poking and prodding with needles began to collapse my veins. I was about to have surgery to correct the problem when a doctor vetoed the operation at the last minute and instead prescribed warm compresses and massages to rejuvenate the veins. It worked. That success was short-lived, however, when an IV catheter (a device that keeps a vein open) fell out of my arm and a nurse shot me up straight with meds from a syringe, which wasn’t supposed to be done. My body was on fire for two days until the effects wore off.

  About seven weeks into my hospital stay, it was deemed that I should begin to get around on crutches and use a wheelchair. Easier said than done. Two months earlier I was lifting literally tons of weights on any given visit to the gym; now walking twenty paces down a hallway wore me out.

  I was determined to do my best to get back into fighting shape. To that end, the cops who were guarding me went way above and beyond their security responsibilities. These guys would hold me up in the beginning as I tried to navigate my way around the hospital hallways on crutches. They stayed past their tours working with me, cajoling me, giving me confidence, and encouraging me to take one more step. I also had to learn how to navigate between a wheelchair and crutches.

  I began to realize that my policing days were over. Initially I went through a phase of denial; I was going to get better, go back to the gym and build myself back to my fighting weight. I’d get my promotion to first grade and get back on the street. Everything was going to be fine.

  But it wouldn’t be. By an ironic twist of fate, a car accident accomplished what literally hundreds of New York’s most violent criminals tried to achieve: putting me out of commission.

  Denial morphed into anger, then, finally, acceptance. I’d never again be the physical specimen I was before the accident, and there was no denying that. I realized that at age thirty-four, discounting the damage I’d endured, there were bad guys out there half my age that were quicker and more ruthless than the thugs I’d been dealing with for fourteen years. In any other profession, thirty-four is prime, but being a cop in the Bronx ages you quickly. The NYPD would undoubtedly put me out of the job on a line-of-duty disability. I resigned myself to the fact that I was going to be a retired detective and there was nothing I could do about it. It would take a while before that happened, and I was going to concentrate on getting better. I would deal with being a civilian when the time came.

  * * *

  ESU supplied an ambulance for me the day I was released from the hospital and took me home. The Detectives Endowment Association (DEA) provided a maid/chauffeur during the week for three months, and Grace moved in and cared for me around the clock.

  I was still pretty much a mess. I was very weak, tired easily, and could barely get around in a wheelchair, let alone on crutches. It would be eight more months before I was totally ambulatory. For now, it was baby steps.

  While I was in the hospital, my brother took care of my ten-year-old female German shepherd, Timba, who liked exercising as much as I did. I had to come to grips with the realization that I could no longer care for her. It broke my heart, but I had to find a suitable home for a full-grown dog. My brother knew two young women who lived together and were dog lovers who were happy to
take Timba. After all I’d seen and been through, one of the toughest things I ever had to do was give that dog away. I cried and grieved as if a friend had died.

  I was chomping at the bit to get back to the gym and did so while I was still confined to a wheelchair. My DEA-supplied maid took me. Initially, I could work only my upper body. My first workout didn’t last long; I totally exhausted myself within five minutes. Gym sessions grew incrementally longer after that, but progress was snail-like. By the time I could depend entirely on crutches, I was squeezing out fifteen- to twenty-minute workouts.

  November 1983

  It was time to think about the reality of retirement. The NYPD provided me with an accountant to advise me on the various options for maximizing my benefits. In addition to health and pension considerations, I was advised to wait until the first of the year (January 1, 1984) to get interviewed by the medical board and submit my retirement papers. That way, it was explained to me, I could take full advantage of additional benefits that would not have been afforded me had I chosen to retire sooner.

  The interview with the medical board went quickly. They scrutinized my hospital records and asked me questions regarding my mobility. They reserved a decision, but by the time I got home my phone was ringing. It was someone from the board advising me that I’d been granted a full job-connected disability pension.

  It was over. It was my time to decompress, to take it easy and enjoy what life had to offer. What had just become clear was that I would now be a former member of the NYPD.

  Epilogue

  I hadn’t been back to the Four-One in almost thirty years.

  Retiring from police work isn’t like retiring from a civilian job, primarily because it isn’t a job; it’s a lifestyle. Not too many jobs in the private sector require that you be on call 24/7. Not too many occupations other than the military and firefighting have you working side-by-side with someone who would give their life to save yours.

  Being a police officer is also being part of a culture, one that a noncop can never quite understand. Police officers work in a vacuum; there are cops and there’s everyone else. So when you leave the job, you’re no longer a part of us; you’re part of them.