A Police Story

I had to work the 2pm-10:30pm one Sunday back in 1987. It was a hot August day and when I got to the Police Station, the morning shift guy, Bill Eady, was coming in from his shift. Now Bill had always worked the day shift and aside from picking up mail for the City, he hardly ever saw any action. While were were talking about how things were, we got a call.

Some anonymous caller told us to go to Microwave Tower Road (It had the repeater tower on it at the top of a hill) They did not tell us what we would find. Bill took off with me right behind him. You could tell he was a little excited to be going on a call. This was in Graysville, AL, the little country town that I told you all about last time. Anyway, we get to the end of Microwave Tower Road and a car, if I remember correctly, it was a Chevy Corsica, is sitting there with a dark haired girl in the front seat. As we approached the car we could see that she had been shot right in the side of the head with a small calibre gun.(Later determined a suicide with a .25 Raven auto) She had a tiny hole in her right temple with just a little dried blood running down the side of her head.

Now, it is August, 100 degrees and she has been in the car a couple of days, since, we determine, the previous Friday. Her lips had turned black and her eyeballs were glazed over and had crinkled with that stare of the dead. Anyway, Bill in his enthusiasm rips the door open just as I was saying, "DON'T". Well the smell hits him full force and he literally turned green. Then he ran to the side of the road and vomited his head off. I really tried not to laugh but he had laughed at me when I hurled my nuts. I knew that it was going to smell and was conveniently on the other side of the car and did not get the full blast effect in the face that he got. But, the whiff I did get was nauseating but not hurl inducing to me. Come to find out, she was depressed over a guy, and had substance abuse problems and she thought that killing herself was the easy way out. I can tell you that it never is.