I slowed way down and waved at a local l.e.o. the other day ,
He was set up at a place where they usually shoot the radar.

No wave back

this was at 11:a.m.

so I backed way up , 60 feet in front of him,
wave again, .....nothing.

pull up along side his s.u.v. , don't know this guy , must be new to the area.

4 minutes go by no response,
I hope he was sleeping .
had the mirror sun glasses on.

pulled away and called the non emergency number
, they said they would give him a wake up call on his cell.

1st time I had ever seen it .

what would the Ten code be for that ?
a 10- triple Z ?

Not sure what the code it.

Our chief (he was a LT at the time) found one of our guys sleeping during night shift so he parked around the building, snuck up and banged on the passenger window and ran away. Luckily he didn't get shot but that officer never fell asleep again.

Poor bastard probably worked midnights and got ordered for days

You didn t see the little inflation valve sticking out the right side of his neck, did you.

Here is a sleeping on duty story:
I worked midnights the previous day then spent the following 8 hours in court. Then got ordered in to work at 8 PM. I got a hour nap in before coming in. I worked the street until 3 AM and made sure our bars closed down before saying enough already.
I went home, put the Crown Vic in the garage, got into my recliner and said good night.
About an hour later, I heard dispatch send the beat car to a nearby restaurant on report of someone loitering outside the building. I got up and drove over, just in time to see a man run out of the restaurant. Which was now on fire! After a short foot chase, I got the dude. Turns out he had set the restaurant on fire for the owner, so the owner could collect the insurance. Not a bad pinch. Maybe I should have slept more!
And getting ordered in at 8 PM is way better than being ordered to stay over on day shift.

Work a shift in his shoes. My shift (we worked alone) would typically go to 0200. If I was processing a DUI arrest that might extend to 0300 or later. Night shift always took call outs until day shift began.

Every 4 months we changed shifts. My shift would rotate from nights to day shift, so I had to come back at 0600. But because I was the only night shift unit, I was on call out until the day shift began. Many times I would get called out and still be on duty from the previous night shift when my new day shift began, again with no one to take the shift for me.

That's two back to back 8 hour shifts with a call out in between. The longest shift(s) I worked was 23 hours straight. The human body can only tolerate so much.

The day shift unit would stay on until the night shift unit was in the area. Court, sick leave, vacation, training, vehicle service all played a part in whether one shift got off on time or the next shift got into the area on time.

Constantly rotating shifts are murder and ought to be outlawed because the disrupt your circadian rhythm.

Many years ago in a department where I worked in the Midwest a reserve officer would come in after work on Friday night and work a midnight shift to get his time in. He was famous for cooping behind the Public Works department in the wee hours when it was quiet. A couple of our officers sneaked up and jacked the rear wheels of his cruiser off the ground and left him like that sleeping. When it was time to come in at the end of shift he had to figure out why his cruiser wouldn't go. He never mentioned it to anyone and I never saw him on mids again.

BTDT.

You just have to hide a whole lot better than that.

One of my coworkers many years ago was working a mids shift and couldn’t stay awake. He pulled onto the parking lot of a local car dealership and pulled into the back row to take a little siesta.

Now mind you, we worked in a very small county where the rolled up the streets at 8. At 3 AM, you could go hours without seeing oncoming headlights. That was mainly semi traffic.

He just dozed off and a Japanese tourist who was passing through starts beating on his window. Dude sparks no English. The officer was obviously startled, but started to wonder if it was just a Dream.

Bad officer safety, but absolutely hilarious.

Now.....

I doubt that they write more than 5 tickets a month , within the tiny town city limits.

out in the county might be a different story.

tiny town bought a s.u.v. for them and the county supplies an officer for 40 hours per week.

pretty good guys mostly, easy goin , in 11 years I've on had to dial nine one one twice,
both times they responded within 20 minutes

I used to work 2 on 2 off with a sliding weekend, on Monday we switched from nights to days...12 hour shifts...they sucked but there are much worse schedules...and in reality all the hours of a day must be covered.

We knew a few would dose off, but I always told new guys that I was training, tell your Sgt and go park at the PD and go inside, that way you won’t get hurt.

We used to try and find one guy who we knew was sleeping...it took me a year, but I found him parked in the “deadline” of broken police cars at the city lot....genius

He's not sleeping. Well, he's pining for the fjords.

yeah, the rotation shift work is killer on the body. I only sleep 4-5 hrs a day now, if i'm lucky.

we were on permanent 12 hr shifts for years and everyone was happy. someone filed a grievance about something and admin put us on permanent 8s for a year until someone else filed a grievance, now we are back on rotation 8s.

all 3 shifts. we rotate every 28 days. nights to afternoons to days then back to nights.

43 months, 3 weeks and 6 days to go...

So the guy is exhausted and sleepy ... would you prefer that he be attempting to drive down the road?

He was inspecting his eyelids.

From what I have heard Orion,Illinois is kind of like Mayberry. No worries unless Otis let himself out early.
BTW you did the right thing, calling nonemergency number. We all get tired.

the deputy that answered started giggling ,and thanked me

.

If you ever get caught sleeping on the job...

The first words out of your mouth when being woken up must be....

Amen!

No Sir, I was not asleep ~ I was praying which is a protected activity under the 1st Amendment of our Constitution!

MA State Troopers were notorious for falling asleep while doing Big Dig details - lots of pictures and even videos of it on the news for a bit

I don't think anything ever happened

One last boring sleeping on duty story:
I was getting gas one morning and was approached by a grinning resident. The man told me I needed go over to the nearby Kroger lot where "something strange is happening". He refused to go into detail.
When I landed in the Kroger lot, I found a small group of people standing in a large circle. In the middle of the circle was my co-workers patrol car. Slowly turning in a 360 degree circle with my buddy asleep at the wheel. I resolved the issue by running up to the car and pounding on the roof.
Of course this made him a legend within the department!
The rest of the story: Turns out he had terminal cancer and was keeping it a secret from not only his family but the department as well. He died about a month later.

Oh, it happens. I'll raise my hand, but it was rare. I never ever slept alone. Car to car with your trusted beat partner. Take turns. Or when doubled up "just wake me up when we get there and tell me which one to shoot". Not about being lazy, but about working 60+ hours in a week with a family and work shit going on during day hours that you were required to do.

I've worked evenings or nights most of my career. 4p-2a for the first couple of years, then 7p-7a for a few years, then 6p-4a, etc...now 7p-5a. I worked some day hours on patrol and as a detective, but the majority has been night.

Thank god I've never worked somewhere that you had to rotate. F that noise.

Have no doubts--the third watch is horrible. Not actually working it, but having court, training, teaching, meetings, kids, family functions, etc. during the day, then having to come back to work that night because of minimum staffing. There should be a shift differential, but my agency doesn't do it.

I have officers that have court once or twice in a work week sometimes, or are on standby for felony trials for days at a time. They are lucky to get 4 hours of sleep. Single moms, single dads...it's a rough life.

I try to look out for them. I also let them know that I won't condone them sleeping, but if they do it they damn well better do it with a partner watching their back, and I damn well better not hear about it.

We've had a few (not on my watch) that fell asleep in their hiding spots and missed their end of duty time. Before GPS on patrol cars it was quite a big deal, the whole city or division looking around for you. Now it's just checking your location on the map. Had one guy fall asleep while on perimeter for a homicide K9 track. I took care of that one myself.

Luckily my division is too busy in general for them to sleep. Saves me some headaches.