In an instant my mind raced back to the cold winter night of January 25, 1994. I was finishing up my last night on the midnight shift (we rotated shifts weekly back then). I was a young and still very naive "veteran" officer with a whole year and a half under my belt. You could say I had a "flame" a mile long and was constantly on the prowl for criminal activity. My former FTO turned beat partner, Jim Walch, was quite my opposite. A Marine who lived by the mantra of "run your calls and back people up" and when you are not doing that be seen and not heard! Jim was constantly irritated by my need to be active and my calling out with suspicious situations which disrupted his reading sessions in the park. Make no mistake, Jim would always be the first one on the scene to back me up and I could hear him coming a mile away.
In the early morning hours of January 25th, 1994, even I was starting to wear down from a week of midnight shifts and looking forward to getting home and sleeping it off. Jim and I met for a cup of coffee a couple hours before the shift ended and had a great conversation, mostly about his ex-wife and the frustration she caused him and my daughter who was hitting the "terrible two's" at the time. When we parted ways Jim headed into the station to turn in a report and I headed to the 24 hour grocery store to buy diapers. We said goodbye until our daywork shift started three days later. Little did I realize at the time we were saying goodbye forever.
Had I known what would happen I never would have gone for those diapers. The store was quite a bit out of my way, but the only place that was open at five o'clock in the morning. While en route, I came to a red light behind two Honda Accords. Something about them aroused my suspicion as a approached them. For some reason they appeared to be together. This was confirmed as they both sped through the red light and made a u-turn. Suddenly my flame was reignited! I quickly turned behind them and attempted to pull them over (not thinking through how I was tactically and safely going to pull two cars over at once by myself). It did not matter, they were not about to stop. I would find out later that both cars had just been stolen moments before I came upon them. The chase was on. What happened next is a blur of tunnel vision one encounters when their adrenaline is bursting through their body. This is a summary of my memories:
- One of them is fishtailing
- When did the roads get icy?
- 1J1 I'm in a pursuit
- Crash, bail out, chasing on foot
- A lot of chaotic traffic on the radio
- Why are they not restricting radio traffic for me, I'm in a pursuit
- How long is this guy going to be able to run before he tires out
- Where the hell is my backup?
- Get on the ground Mother F-----
- 1J1 one in custody
- That's right, I caught your ass!
- Where the hell is my backup?
As a 23 year old this was the first time life had really kicked me in the gut. For a long time I harbored alot of guilt and felt responsible for Jim's death. In the short time we worked together we had grown very close and I learned an awful lot from him. Its now 18 years later and I still think about him almost every day.
On May 12th, I will be running in memory of Officer James Walch, and I hope you will be too!
To register for the Police Week 5K visit http://nationalpoliceweek5k.com/.
And remember, run your calls and back each other up!
