The night when police and Delta Force men patrolled the streets of New Orleans

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New Orleans police at night

Midnight is the witching hour for cops. Not just any cops, but these “special task force” cops that we were hooked up and running down bad guys with for the second consecutive night in New Orleans, Louisiana. What a thrill every second was, sitting there in the back seat of a police cruiser on an authorized ride-along with “Nawlin’s” finest.

However, fewer Delta men were interested in this ride-along opportunity on the second night. That is because of those who had chosen one of their two evenings off from urban training to ride along with on-duty cops, many had dedicated their second evening to a night on the town making the social scene bar hopping.

Guys like Chill-D and I were not interested in the bar scene, so we also spent a second night riding along with our police brethren. This time around we went with one Delta man per team of police officers. I only saw Chill-D when we happened to both be at downtown central lockup at the same time to deliver a suspect to jail booking.

“How’s it going, Chill? What do you bring us this fine evening?”

“Suspected drug trafficking. He had at least 12 small baggies of meth stashed in his socks.”

“Same here, Chill, we got a suspect on possession with intent to sell meth. This guy was standing on a street corner and tossed something in the grass behind him as we rolled by. The cops jumped out and subdued him… they found he had a small stash in his mouth that he was trying to swallow,” I replied.

“One of the cops had his hand around the guy’s throat and was yelling at him to spit it out, keeping him from swallowing with a choke hold.”

“Did you stay in the back seat of the car like you were supposed to?” Chill asked me.

“Oh, hell no I didn’t stay in the car. I was on the perp crossing his legs with a painful joint lock there where he lay on the ground with a cop on him.”

“Oh great… if the old man finds out about this we will both be on his $hit list,” Chill-D said referring to our Delta squadron commander.

“Well, the cops were appreciative toward me… glad I was there to help out.”

Related: How Delta Force thanked police after a week of urban combat training

New Orleans – 3rd & Dryades Central City. Police car and officers during neighborhood festivities, March 2010. (Photo by Derek Bridges/Wikimedia Commons)

And so it went with “the Reverend” Chill-D and me on our second night out on patrol with our police brothers.

After a while, my team and I stopped at a quick mart to get a steaming cup of coffee – my treat. You should have seen that small place empty out when we sauntered in. (Everybody was guilty in these neighborhoods at night when the sun was asleep, so there was plenty of non-stop action.)

At this point, I’m put in mind of the knee-jerk reaction I have every time I see a person wearing a hoodie… Come on, how many times do transgressors have to be arrested wearing a hoodie to equate hoodies with lawbreakers, thugs, and just all-around up-to-no-good punks? This was the profile that our next suspect presented when we screeched tires and bailed from the cruiser to dog pile onto the punk.

Once the suspect was up and handcuffed, we did a full body search on him. He was wearing a hoodie (of course) with a pouch pocket sleeve on the abdomen to put your hands in. I reached inside the sleeve and felt something like wet meat. Pulling it out it was… an exposed slice of bologna sausage.

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bologna slice
A bologna slice was not the strangest thing these cops had ever found. (Photo by Geoff Lane/Wikimedia Commons)

I was horrified by the unprotected bologna and the whole situation and looked to the cop for an explanation:

“Hey, it’s to be expected. We have found even stranger things on some of these weirdo junkies. He was probably saving the slice of bologna for when he felt hungry later.”

“Oh, Lord” was all I could muster to pardon the strange finding.

Working through the search I pulled out what appeared to be a pager, but it was hollow and clearly just a front gadget for the sake of status. You see, a man with a pager in this environment is viewed as a happening man with a lot going on. What a farce he and the pager were.

We deposited the suspect and the evidence to booking at the town’s central lockup. This time there was no Chill-D there on his wild adventure with the New Orleans special police force. Me, I was for sure experiencing my own night of wild entertainment.

I never regretted choosing patrolling over partying in the night air of of the Big Easy; I think it made me a better person overall.

You may hear talk of “seeing how the other half lives.” Well, I have certainly seen the other half and was shocked by the level of depravity therein. I imagine every city of any size has the same version of this rat race existence that is present in Nawlins (New Orleans) today. The names may be different, but the lifestyle is the same.

By Almighty God and with honor,

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Feature Image: Night on Canal Street, New Orleans, 2011. (Photo by Gary J. Wood/Wikimedia Commons)

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George Hand

Master Sergeant US Army (ret) from the 1st Special Forces Operational Detachment-Delta, The Delta Force. In service, he maintained a high level of proficiency in 6 foreign languages. Post military, George worked as a subcontracter for the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) on the nuclear test site north of Las Vegas Nevada for 16 years. Currently, George works as an Intelligence Analyst and street operative in the fight against human trafficking. A master cabinet-grade woodworker and master photographer, George is a man of diverse interests and broad talents.