Whisper in the Shadows
Welcome to ‘Whispers in the Shadows’, your gateway into the nerve-wracking work of undercover policing. The true stories of a real-life undercover cop. I’m Michael Bates, an ex-undercover police officer, and this was my reality for over two years. If your fascinated by the truth that lies beneath crime shows, if you hunger for the real-life stories that leap beyond the boundaries of fiction, ‘Whispers in the Shadows’ is here to satisfy your curiosity. From infiltrating drug syndicates to living a double life, every episode uncovers a thrilling true story that pitted me against the face of danger. Don’t miss out on the chance to step into my shoes and experience what it takes to walk the thin line between law and crime. Subscribe to ‘Whispers in the Shadows’ and join me, as we delve into the gritty world of undercover policing.
Whisper in the Shadows
Behind the Thin Blue Line, a Conversation - Episode 3 with Paul Milone Part 1
Every career path has its own set of stories and secrets, but few are as inherently riveting as those from behind the badge. In our latest podcast, we sit down with Paul, a seasoned former Omaha Police Officer and undercover narcotics officer, who shares the gripping chronicles of his law enforcement life. His book "Ram One" is a testament to the rollercoaster ride of emotions and adrenaline he experienced, and he's not holding back any details. From humorous pranks between colleagues to the intense psychological warfare of undercover operations, Paul paints a vivid picture of a profession that's as unpredictable as it is structured.
The camaraderie of the force is a theme that threads through our conversation with Paul. It’s not all high-speed chases and tense stand-offs; there’s a shared bond that only those who’ve walked the thin blue line can truly understand. Paul recounts his first foray into the gritty underworld of narcotics, the strategic intricacies that go into maintaining a cover story, and the close calls that shaped his impressive career. His journey from a rookie with dreams influenced by his father's restaurant business to an expert in covert procedures is a compelling narrative of adaptation and dedication.
Our dialogue extends an open hand to those who've donned the uniform, inviting them to join the discussion and share their unique perspectives. For listeners, this episode promises a rare glimpse into the complex realm of law enforcement—a chance to comprehend the sacrifice and resolve needed to protect and serve. As we explore Paul's stories, we gain not just an understanding but an appreciation for the multifaceted lives of those who uphold the law, and the weight they carry long after the badge comes off.
Paul's book Ram One can be found on Amazon - https://www.amazon.com/Ram-One-Stories-Undercover-Breaking/dp/B0CXZPBNM8
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Welcome to Behind the Thin Blue Line, a Whisper in the Shadows podcast. In each city, in every neighbourhood, on every street they stand tall, those in blue guardians of our community, our protectors. But who are they really? Behind the Thin Blue Line is the podcast that takes you behind the badge, beyond the headlines, and into the hearts of those who serve and protect. We're here to break down barriers and to tear down the walls of misunderstanding. We're here to listen to their stories, their triumphs, their fears. Ever wonder what it's like serving undercover, or what's the real-life impact of policing, or how they cope with trauma? Listen as we step into the shoes of those who walk the thin blue line. You have heard my true stories of what it's really like to be an undercover cop. I want to give a voice to all those living amongst us, unseen and unnoticed, who have put their life on the line being a police officer, hopefully to give you, the listener, a glimpse into something you will likely never get to experience Uncover the complex world of law enforcement and the raw human experiences behind the badge. Join me, jason Somerville, your host and a former police officer myself, as we navigate through these stories on Behind the Thin Blue Line. Let's go and meet our next guest line. Let's go and meet our next guest.
Speaker 1:All right, welcome to Behind the Blue Line, a podcast where I explore the human side of policing. Thank you for joining me again. I'm Jason Somerville and I was a Queensland police officer for 14 years and as well as that, I spent two years working undercover. Now you've been listening to the stories of Michael Bates, my alter ego of my time undercover. Well, I've decided that it's time we heard from other cops, other undercover cops and other general policing to tell their stories, who was rather a former police officer and a former undercover police officer based in the Omaha Police Force in Nebraska, the USA. Rather, he's also a published author of his book Ram One. Good afternoon there, paul. How are you?
Speaker 2:I'm doing great, jason, how about yourself.
Speaker 1:Mate, I am fantastic For anyone watching and listening. It's 7.30 in the morning here and 4.30 on yesterday in the States, so I'm happy to be awake. I'll put it that way. Look, thanks for agreeing to join the podcast and for agreeing to chat about your general policing and your undercover work. Now, just before we go any further, your book. Tell us a little bit about that and where people can find it your book.
Speaker 2:Tell us a little bit about that and where people can find it. Yeah, the book's titled ram one. Uh, you'll find on amazon and basically it's just a book about my career working undercover and being on the SWAT team and the normal stuff that cops do before you get to those positions. Kind of had a crazy career and I figured I'd put it on paper sounds good.
Speaker 1:Um, I, I think most cops have a crazy, crazy career. If we're being honest, how long were you in the police for 23 years full time.
Speaker 2:I currently went back and I've been part time for about a year working to train an academy in the firearms range.
Speaker 1:Okay, how old were you when you joined?
Speaker 2:I was 29 when I went through the academy.
Speaker 1:Okay, so you worked prior to becoming a police officer. You had an understanding of what life was like.
Speaker 2:Yeah, which I think makes makes way better cops than a 21 year old who doesn't doesn't have an understanding about life and uh takes those calls trying to tell people how to lead their lives when they really don't know how to lead their own yeah, guilty, um, because that's what it was like as a 21 year old going out and talking to some 45 year old who, uh, they're going.
Speaker 1:What do you know, son, you're right, yeah, this is very true. All right, so you, you're currently going back part-time. Um, what does that involve?
Speaker 2:I've been lucky enough to get to go out to the training academy and work with new recruits and I took the career that I had and I added that to the training that we do out there to try to give them the most realistic scenarios we can, as opposed to just standard basics that they have to cover. In addition to that, I work on the patrol rifle range for the current officers to get recertified once a year. Firearms was one of my big backgrounds.
Speaker 1:Yep, okay, so you have both sidearms and rifles. Your police carry both. That is correct, for, I guess, comparison here in Australia um, I know there were some cars when I was in in the job that had the ruger mini 14s in them, but I think they ended up being taken out and, um, mainly, uh, everyday general duties, police carried just their sidearm, which is now a glock. Um, so there's a, there's a small difference there. What did you want to be when you were growing up as a kid and why?
Speaker 2:It's interesting, I never really even thought about it. I was such a weird aloof kid that I was just so into sports I didn't think about it. My dad owned a couple of restaurants and I started working in the restaurants when I was 11, bussing tables and then into the kitchen and learning the aspects of the restaurant. So my fall semester and my first semester in college, I was taking business classes because I simply knew my soul that I'd run one of my dad's restaurants and thankfully, about six months later he sold all three of them and I was. I was set free from that uh forced career choice. Can you cook? I can, and I love cooking for people. It's just a restaurant business is a hard business to be in yeah, no it, especially now.
Speaker 1:I would have thought over the last five years it would have been uh, it's tough everywhere that sort of business, all right. So you, you, you thought you were going to to uh, follow your father's footsteps. You went to business school. Did you finish your business qualification?
Speaker 2:no, I, as soon as you sold the restaurants, I immediately changed my degree to criminal justice, uh, which I completed why did you do that?
Speaker 1:what was the impetus behind doing that?
Speaker 2:uh, one of my best friend's dads was the was the chief of federal probation in the state of Nebraska and I was just like, well, maybe that's a good career. What's federal probation? If an inmate goes to prison and gets released, they're on parole. When they leave In the states, you can get probation which is ahead of going to jail or prison. It's very similar to parole, but it's pre-incarceration.
Speaker 1:Okay, so it's like a good behavior bond almost.
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 1:Okay, cool, sorry, I interrupted you. You were going to say something else.
Speaker 2:But even making that change in the schooling, I didn't even think much about it. I was like, well, okay, I'll change to this and I just bebopped through college you know the university, like I'm just living. For the day I played American football in college and literally that was my main focus. And when I got towards the end of where I almost had my degree, I met my wife, who was also studying the same program.
Speaker 1:Yep.
Speaker 2:And after after she graduated, she got hired by the police department. Almost right away I went into a job in corrections, which I did not like. For about two years After struggling there, I moved on to a place for troubled youth, which is where I'd worked when I was younger. I loved that job, but it just wasn't a career path, I thought. And after my wife was an officer for several years, I would go to crew parties with her or you know social events and listening to all those cops that she worked with tell these stories and I'm like, man, I got to get some of that. I just knew there was an itch I had that. I'm like I have to do something different. You know, the place I worked was a good place with a good mission, but I just knew I wasn't fulfilling, you know, a career choice for me. So after she had five years on, I got hired and never looked back.
Speaker 1:Would you class yourself as an altruistic person? Do you think you?
Speaker 2:know I guess somewhat. You know I was interesting. I have my degrees in criminal justice but my master's degrees in human services and some of my cop friends used to say that I was the bleeding heart of the crew. Because of that background I think it served me well later. But you know, I believe in the good of man and trying to be part of that good in society and yeah, so I guess somewhat.
Speaker 1:Yeah, look, because I have a theory that intrinsically, the majority of people that go into policing, whether they understand it or not, have a strong altruistic streak in them, that they believe in man, as you said, they believe in humanity, they believe in the good, in people, and they go there to try and find that and keep that safe.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you know. And again it gets kind of funny because almost every, at least in the States, the running joke is that you ask a brand-new cop why he did the job and they will say, well, I wanted to help people. And then you get later on in the career and it's like, eh, they joke about that.
Speaker 1:But I do the same thing.
Speaker 2:And it is still true. Cops will say oh, oh, that's all bs, but that's because they're they're, they're, they're hurting themselves to, to keep to keep the the bad that they see out. You know they toughen their outer shell and try to act all tough and it's like but you know, when they retire and you talk to them, they still did the job because they want to help people, they want to keep, keep good people away from the evil.
Speaker 1:Yeah, no, that's very true. You've touched on a couple of things and I'll come back and explore them. I guess so your wife's become a police officer. You've done some other things. You've applied.
Speaker 2:How did that journey then go, from when you applied to starting, and what was your first sort of, you know, posting shift, whatever, however it works you know, in our department we have to work the the streets, you know, driving a just a patrol cruiser for three years minimum before you can try to do anything else.
Speaker 2:I spent four total years in patrol and then I was given opportunity to go to a special operations unit, a gang suppression unit, at our, at our secret location, and so I spent four years excuse me, four years in the gang unit. And man, you want to talk about the wild west? You know, for again, I worked the hardest precinct in omaha when, when I worked at so I was used to some of the chaos. But you know we I wasn't doing dope deals, we weren't doing search warrants and patrol, but we got to the gang unit and jason, we were serving dozens of search warrants a month and doing dope buys and rips and chasing down hardened gang members through the projects you know, housing project units, and it was crazy amounts of overtime and but it was, yeah, it was. When I stepped into that I'm like, wow, this is, uh, this is police in here it's sort of there goes I did it to help people to go.
Speaker 1:Hmm, who am I? Yeah, how long is your police Academy training program?
Speaker 2:Uh, it's 21 weeks, generally speaking. I went through an abbreviated Academy for whatever reason, whatever monetary reason, but it's 21 weeks. And then you'd have about 21 more weeks in the field training uh section for your, your paired up with uh, you know uh, uh know a pro, and you, you do the ride along for for another 21 weeks so, and then after that your single officers or your double officer patrols it just depends on which precinct you're in and what the staffing level is.
Speaker 2:I went to a precinct that was was busy and even though a bunch of us on my first crew were rookies, a lot of us were in two officer cars or baker cars, we call it Okay.
Speaker 1:Now just, I guess, for clarification. So in Australia you join a state police force or service and they can post you anywhere in the state. Queensland's very big I've been right up to the pointy part and as far west as you can go as well, and we're talking, you know, three and a half thousand kilometers north and about 1,800 kilometers west from where I sit at the moment, so you can get sent anywhere. Does that work the same with I'm assuming you were with the state police or were you with the county police? How does that work?
Speaker 2:No, see, the US, we've got all sorts of police officers, police forces. So I worked for the city of Omaha and even though I was certified for the state of Nebraska as a law enforcement officer police forces, yep. So I worked for the city of Omaha and even though I was I was certified for the state of Nebraska as a law enforcement officer my jurisdiction was simply the city of Omaha. We also have state officers, like you, we have city officers, we have officers, we have deputies that work for the county. And then, you know, because Omaha is just its own city, there's many small cities and towns around the city I work in that have departments as well. So we have many more layers of law enforcement here, it seems, in addition to our federal agencies as well.
Speaker 1:So you could. If you went to a precinct, you would stay there for a long period of time, or they'd move you around precincts within the city, or how does that work?
Speaker 2:You know. We had a really good system, or we still do. We do a shift bid every six months and you bid on the shift you're going to work, you know what time of day and you bid on which precinct you want to work in. And, as the new guys, sometimes you get bumped around because you don't have enough seniority. But there's guys who have worked in the same precinct for 20 plus years just because they chose to do it, and you're not forced to try to get promoted.
Speaker 2:You can stay as just the lowest level of officer if you choose to do so, or you can go through the promotional rank and then you get moved around when that happens.
Speaker 1:Okay, so you've joined the police. You did your four years in patrol. You then went to the gang unit or the specialist unit. How long into your career did you go undercover, and how did that come about?
Speaker 2:So, four years in patrol, four years in gang, one year in a in the general detective's bureau wearing a shirt and tie, which was the least enjoyable part of my career, um, and then, right after that, I went into the narcotics unit, uh, where I spent the last 14 years of my career working undercover.
Speaker 1:So I guess it sounds like talking to other people from North America in general that undercover is treated differently. You will work both undercover and normal policing in the same week sometimes.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and especially for our department. Just because someone's in narcotics doesn't mean that they're undercover, right, they're plainclothes. I did direct undercover deals for that for the lion share that 14 years. But additionally I was I was attached to our department's SWAT team for 16 years, obviously longer than narcotics. So when I would do any of my SWAT work, anything that I did outside of our secret office, so to speak, if I was in around other police officers, then I just had a balaclava cover in my face because I was dual tasked, yeah, and so I worked undercover 14 years, but it wasn't like I was, you know, living in some house for 14 years by myself, or that I was with the Hells Angels, or that I was with, you know, the Mexican cartel.
Speaker 1:Yeah, um, my undercover status and I maintain my anonymity, um, outside of that building that I worked in, um, as best I could during that time frame okay, so I'll come to some of the stories and and um, you know there are some really good stories for for those that are listening that I've seen I just want to just drop back into your book. When did you write it and why did you write it?
Speaker 2:What's crazy is this coming weekend was the one-year anniversary when I started writing the book. I started writing May of 2023, and I handed in my original manuscript in November 115,000 words, way too long and my editor chopped it up and got it back to me in December. Then, for the next until February, we went back and forth, changing this, fixing that, basically just reshuffling where stuff was going to be, and the book came out in March of this year. So it was a nine-month, 10-month process, which is pretty fast. But I will say this is that insomnia can be a writer's best friend Type from 10 pm to 8 am because you can't sleep. You know, it just really flowed fast. I thought it would take much longer to do it.
Speaker 1:No, that's good. Is there anything they cut out that you wish they hadn't?
Speaker 2:Oh there's so much.
Speaker 2:I did the best I could to tell stories about a lot of the people that I worked with. You know things that I was involved in, but other officers and some of the finite details my editor, who's a wonderful lady, you know she says the person in Australia doesn't really care about that because they don't know that person. You know him, that's important to lady. You know she says the person in Australia doesn't really care about that because they don't know that person. You know him, that's important to you. So a lot of the stories got cut down. Some of the specific stories that were cut out were just more drug cases or more SWAT operations. Yeah, I just wanted to know to answer that. I guess there were some of the joking stuff we did when I was a patrol officer where we messed with each other. We played pranks on each other during our shift. There were some really, really good ones.
Speaker 1:What's the best prank you ever played or had played on you?
Speaker 2:You know we used to do this dumb thing If guys were on a call, we'd sneak up, because all the cars had the same key. It didn't matter. We drove Ford Crown Vix.
Speaker 1:I know where this is going.
Speaker 2:Pull up to a guy that's on a busy call. He put down his back passenger window or back driver window Previously. You have to have a handful of broken glass from an automobile accident and you try to get a piece that's maybe this big that's still intact. You throw the loose pieces on the back of the seat, you put a rock or a brick in the back seat and you take the piece that's this big and you stuff it in the in the window ceiling and he walks out and he thinks someone threw a brick through his window and, as dumb as that is to sit back a block away and watch him.
Speaker 2:you know it just cut the uh, they cut the tensions, you know, because it is such a hard job, as you well know yeah and it's harder these days, maybe not because crime is harder or more violent, it's just it's harder because cops probably across the world but I know in america they're not allowed to do that kind of stuff, they're not allowed to vent and let off steam and that's all that stuff is when you're messing around with your buddies and you have to let off steam. Because yesterday you took a call where a guy put a shotgun in his mouth and pulled the trigger and his eyelid was on the refrigerator when you walked in and you're supposed to do a report and go on about your business and then have it not affect you. Are you kidding me? And we can't? And you're supposed to do a report and go on about your business and then have it not affect you. Are you kidding me? And we can't vent and we can't laugh and have fun.
Speaker 2:So some of those fun things were taken away. But, man, when I was still in doing that, the crews that I run, we did it all the time. It was a riot.
Speaker 1:Well, maybe not that Usually, if there was ever so, we have a lot of schools and things in one of the areas that are actually just about everywhere I worked. But on night work sometimes it's not as busy as other nights and if there's a job at a school, the car will get tasked and they'll pull up. And sometimes they get out and forget and leave their keys in the car, or um, there's always a spare set of keys. So we get back to the station, get the spare set of keys, come back, jump in the car, move the car around the corner and then sit around the other corner and wait for them to come out and go. Where's the car?
Speaker 2:oh yeah, we've done that as well. They said I was the thing with the the ford crown vic. They all had the same keys. I bet you I could okay, I could, I could have pulled up to a. Oh yeah, we've done that as well. That was the thing with the Ford Crown Vic. They all had the same keys. I bet you I could have pulled up to a Ford Crown Vic in Chicago and jumped in and drove away. They were all the same, all keyed.
Speaker 1:The same, not very smart and, like you said, it's juvenile, it's a bit of fun. People will look at it and go, oh, that's just silly, you should be more responsible. But it's a release valve, it's a way of putting laughter and fun into a job where, as you've said, you've seen something that most people will never see in their entire life. People will never see in their entire life and you do that on a regular basis and if you don't laugh and you don't have fun, the effects of it are going to be much greater. And I want to come back to that. Just tell us about your book, where you can get the book, where people who are listening can get the book, and the details will be in the bottom in the description underneath this video.
Speaker 2:Ram1 is the easiest locator on Amazoncom.
Speaker 1:Okay, that's pretty simple. All right, so just getting back to your journey through the police, you've gone to the Narcotics of Drug Squad, as we call it. How did you get into doing undercover?
Speaker 2:Man, jason, I was so excited to do undercover. I was even in the gang unit. I was wanting to do it. Why I wouldn't allow it? Why were you?
Speaker 2:why, you know, my biological father was a drug dealer. Okay, he got caught up in a wiretap with a whole bunch of heroin, six ounces of H, and you know that kind of you know. Of course my mom moved on from him and my stepdad is who raised me and who I took my name after it. Just always, it was always bothersome to me. I don't know if that's why I got into that. I suppose the reason because it's it's it's harder than just using an informant to buy dope. You know, it's a little more challenging, a little more dangerous. Maybe I suppose I was kind of an adrenaline junkie, you know. So maybe that was the reason I never really put my finger on it a hundred percent. And even in the book I don't explain it very well as to why I wanted to do it so badly. But man, I wanted to do it and that's what I did for a long time do you take risks doing it like?
Speaker 1:do you do other things outside of policing and in your general life that people would consider generally risky?
Speaker 2:you know I bungee jumped once, shoot, when I'm back in college. But you know I'm yeah, I'm not a giant risk taker like that, you know it. Uh, I suppose by the time I got into the career and was was doing the things we were doing, it's like, well, these are enough risks, I guess you know, yeah, I, I. You know, I don't consider myself one of those adrenaline junkies. You know, I watch some of these videos now that where these people do the extreme stuff of jumping off a cliff with one of those capes and or the the, the wing suits and walking, they're riding their mountain bike on a on a two foot wide Ridge you know, camelback Ridge on a mountain, and I'm like man, if you fall off you're dead. Um, that's the. Watching those videos scares me, but for me, knocking in a door on a on a homicide suspect was just like going to lunch. That that never bothered me.
Speaker 1:I guess that was it. If you fall off the cliff, like if something doesn't work on the wingsuit or something, you're dead. I would have thought that in the middle of a drug buy, if you say the wrong thing or the wrong person walks in, the same thing could happen, but you don't equate the dangers of both as being the same you know I had, uh, mine was more of just an excitement level and the only real trepidation I had doing the undercover deals was that were they going to believe my story?
Speaker 2:you know, because of my SWAT background and the extensive training we had and it sounds mean or it sounds bravado or sounds callous, I guess, but every deal I went into I had a plan to kill the guy if it went bad. Okay, and that's just silly, and I had, I believe I had the means to do it and so I didn't worry about that part of it. I worried about was he going to call my bluff? And then, you know, say, hey, you're a cop and walk out the door or you know whatever, and then I would just be, I'd be a failure at not getting the deal. I really didn't have a lot of apprehension of doing the deal. My first undercover deal was, you know, I wasn't, I wasn't there yet but, um, that that was quite, a quite a scary deal, to be really honest. What?
Speaker 1:happened there.
Speaker 2:You know. So I had no training. I went to a two-week basic narcotics school when I was still in the gang unit, because in the gang unit we did so much drug work. But when I got to narcotics there wasn't any type of undercover school to go to, or I hadn't seen one yet, and I was just, you know, telling all my crewmates, hey, I want to do an undercover deal. And so, lo and behold, my longtime partner and friend, edie. She had an informant, a Mexican guy who didn't speak English and he wanted to sell guns. I'm like, well, I'll buy guns. So I go do this gun deal with a guy named Jesus. I figured it was safe, you know.
Speaker 1:The.
Speaker 2:Hispanic version of Jesus. I figured it was safe. You know the Hispanic version. Yeah, I forgot. It's gonna be good to go um. He didn't, he didn't die on a cross yes, correct.
Speaker 2:Um, so he didn't speak English. Uh, I spoke very little Spanish and the Spanish I spoke was to tell someone how to get on the ground to put your hand on your back, which wasn't to help me in a dope deal. The informant sat in the back seat of my car, a little two-door Blazer, and anyways, we pull up and he gets in the car and this is a tiny little car to our. If it was two big guys like me, our shoulders would almost be touching in the front seats. And as soon as he got in, he is beating sweat, he is nervous. As he got in, he is, he's beating sweat, he is nervous. He keeps looking out the passenger window like the raid team's coming, and I'm trying to tell him hey, listen, calm down, you know tranquilo. And the informant is telling him to calm down female informant. And so he hands me the gun and it's just a shitty gun, which isn't the crazy part.
Speaker 2:The crazy part was, as soon as he handed me the gun, he put his right hand back in under his, under his coat. He had his hand on a shoulder, he had a shoulder rig and I've held a gun a million times and I know what it's like to have a shoulder rig. I know it's like where the gun is, how you hold it. Now it fills your hand. And he had his right hand on a pistol the whole time and I'm to his, to his left. Um well, my left hand is down by my left thigh, which is on my glock 30, and so here it is, that moment from uh, good, bad, and the ugly with the music playing. Who's going to move first?
Speaker 2:yeah and he keeps looking out the window like the raid team is coming and it's like calm down on. The gun was a piece of crap, like I said. And so the informer was like, well, hey, paul's looking for dope too. You know, he needs a new plug for meth and he was kind of nervous about that. He sold me a gun.
Speaker 2:I don't know why he'd be nervous about meth, but so with his left hand, he never took his right hand out of his coat. With his left hand he gives me, you know, a couple grams of dope. I keep my left hand where it's at. With my right hand I take the gun, I take the dope and I pay him. And it was this weird ballet of he's only using his left hand, I'm only using my right hand. Our other hands were on our guns and he keeps looking out the window like the raid team's coming and I'm thinking, you know, if he pulls the gun out, I'm just going to smash him with my right arm, yeah, lean into him and then shoot him with my left hand.
Speaker 2:Um, and it just was one of those man it was. It was 10 minutes of tension. I don't know it even took that long, but it took about 10 minutes. Um he's. Then he's trying to get me to use to try the dope. You know that one's easy to get out of and I got out of it and he believed me and so no big deal, the deal's fine.
Speaker 2:He leaves and again. So that's not that crazy right. But a week later Edie asked me to buy another gun from him. And I'm like, hell yeah, I'm in, I love this, I want to buy guns and dope and other gun from him. And I'm like, hell yeah, I'm in, I love this, I want to buy guns and dope. And she says, well, paul, I'm not going to let you agree to it until I give you some information.
Speaker 2:I'm like, okay, what's the scoop? She's like, well, we got some information on Jesus that we didn't know last week. Like, what's that? Like you'll, two people in a cartel hit about three, four weeks ago. And so we know he's a murderer. We're not sure if homicide is going to be able to pin the case on him. So we want to continue to buy dope and guns off him to give him the best sentence we can get if we can't prove these murders. So I said, okay, that's cool, at least I know who he is now.
Speaker 2:But I bought dope and guns from him a couple more times and they were successful. And then, unfortunately, his life kind of kicks you in the gut. Sometimes I had an injury on the SWAT team which required surgery during that time frame. So I was pulled away from the case, obviously because I couldn't do it on a limited duty, and consequently Edie took that case to the end and arrested probably 15 people and she won Officer of the Year for the case because it was a fantastic investigation and I got to watch it from the sidelines, which was kind of a bummer, but I was happy for her.
Speaker 1:You're involved at the beginning, did they? Did they pin the murder, the murders, on him?
Speaker 2:they never. They never did. No, he did. I think jesus did eight or ten years and he was deported. It was interesting. I actually did some sleuth work and I found his facebook page down in mexico and, assuming he's staying down there, um fair enough, um, now before.
Speaker 1:so before we we started talking about, um, uh, that particular story. You were talking about how you got into being a UC, a two-week course, and then bang off, you go, you do your first buy, so to speak. The transfer to narcotics was the expectation that, going to narcotics, you would be doing more UC work.
Speaker 2:Well, I was hoping that was going to be the plan, yeah.
Speaker 1:Okay, but it wasn't, it wasn't, it wasn't advertised in the job.
Speaker 2:Yeah, no. And so I did that basic two week course when I was still in the gang unit and then I did, I did some deals and then the school came open and I went to a. I went to an undercover school and then I did a follow-up advanced undercover school.
Speaker 1:How long were the courses?
Speaker 2:They were both a week long, you know, so it's nothing crazy. I tried and tried to get to do some of the big federal, you know, two-month undercover training courses but that was never accepted. I don't know if it worked out, but you just kind of learned on the job. You know, there were some other guys in our, in our department, who had worked undercover and I would pick their brain on how they did what they did. You know how they avoided certain things. And um, and I fully admit, boy, my first couple of years I was not very good, to be honest. You know, I had some successful deals but I did dumb things or said dumb things. Um, I tried to be someone I really wasn't and you know telling this giant long fabricated lie as to who I was. And I soon learned that it was easier to be me and it was easier to tell the truth, me tell 90 truth and a little bit of lie, because you remember the truth.
Speaker 1:And.
Speaker 2:I was way more successful the last 12 years than I was the first two years.
Speaker 1:Did you use covert names or did you use your real name?
Speaker 2:I used my first name and a covert last name and I used a nickname on the street. And again, that was kind of the thing of trying to be somewhat truthful, to remember certain things. You know, I used a variation my birthday. That was easy and a funny, quick story. Um, so I, on my, on my undercover id, my, my state driver's license, I used an address where I used to live when I was younger, and no big deal. How is that ever going to come back and affect me?
Speaker 2:I started buying dope from this female and we only knew her by her first name and some of the other investigators at my offsite. They finally found her in true identity. It's like, okay, cool, this is who it is. Lo and behold, her address on her driver's license was the address I used on my driver's license. Her mother was two residents removed from my mom and dad at the same house, and so just think if, for somehow I would have been dumb enough to say here's my license, here's who I am and here's my address. I didn't. But how many guys get to buy dope from someone who lived in a house where they lived in when they were younger, you know?
Speaker 2:yeah, not many, it was just a crazy coincidence, crazy coincidence it also goes to show how the best planning sometimes can.
Speaker 1:There's nothing is going to stop coincidence, it's just correct. Can't plan for it. It's one of those things. Um, yeah, that's, that's very freaky, all right. So, uh, and as you say, look, one of the things that we got taught is that, um, the best lie has a large amount of truth in it. It's the little details, because, you remember, I use Michael Bates, people say Michael now, and I still turn around Michael became or I became Michael became me or I became Michael, like one of the two, and it's just one of those things that you know, you just I, just that name just sticks with me. So, 14 years, uh, you're married.
Speaker 1:At the time, the operations that we did were you had a bunch of targets. You would go out and you know you get a safe house and you would do the jobs and you would do that operation. Then you come back and then you go do operations. It sounds like you were doing piecemeal operations small by bus over long periods, buy-busts over long periods of time, or small buys over long periods of time while doing other things. Was there ever an operation where you went? I've got to do this, I've got to be someone for three months. Move out of home. You know the whole setup ready to go.
Speaker 2:You know, I never had that opportunity Did you want that opportunity. I thought about it and then I went back to thinking you know what I'm going to do, what I want to do anyways, I wanted to try to intentionally put my family first.
Speaker 1:Yep.
Speaker 2:And I really wouldn't have had that opportunity to do that and I guess I'm glad I didn't have had that opportunity to do that. Um, and I guess I'm I guess I'm glad I didn't have that opportunity. The uh, I was a task force officer with the with our bureau of alcohol, tobacco and firearms and they have guys that do that yeah but I don't believe my department would have even allowed me to do it.
Speaker 2:I know some local ucs um, keep their names out of it who did exactly that. Um, they worked for the fbi as informant and they traveled the country and they'd be gone two months here, two months there, a week here, a week there and the FBI would insert them into ongoing investigations already. But I never did that and he was a super undercover. He's a good friend and, again, I don't believe that my department would ever allow me to do that or anybody else. It's just not what they're into yep, no, that that's.
Speaker 1:That's fair enough. When you first joined the police, did people tell you you look like a police officer? Yes yeah, um, when you were working in the the gang squad, did people tell you you look like a police officer. Could they tell you you were a police officer? Yes, yeah, did that worry you when you became, when you started working undercover?
Speaker 2:It didn't worry me that they would. It would worry me that I would just bump into somebody that I'd already arrested, you know.
Speaker 1:Did that happen? What was the possibility of that happening? Probably pretty good.
Speaker 2:I mean we arrested lots and lots of people. You know, um, did that happen? What was the possibility of that happening? Probably pretty good, because we arrested lots and lots of people. I mean, we were in the gang and we put hundreds of people away a year. It was, it was a free-for-all and, you know, the hunting was good. We we had really aggressive prosecutors that, excuse me at the time, both state and federal, and we were we were bumping up people to no end, um, and you know the other.
Speaker 2:The other issue, jason, is that because I didn't do it to the level you did as far as the backstop, you know, I had an id that would. That was a legitimate id and I had an undercover vehicle that that didn't come back to anything, but I would still have to go to a city pump to get gas. So I would go to the most obscure city pumps I could to get gas and I still have to go to court occasionally. And that was one of the driving forces for me to try to push every case I did undercover, as opposed to hey, I'll go undercover with this guy and use informants for these people. I tried to push everything undercover because then I didn't have to go to court. People wouldn't fight an undercover case they rarely would fight it. So my need to go to the courthouse would be to get an arrest warrant signed or a search warrant signed, and we had the ability to get a hold of a judge who's a duty judge and do that in off hours if we needed to yeah because my biggest fear was walking through the courthouse and you don't like people in suits or
Speaker 2:uh, just all the criminals. I mean just there's hundreds and hundreds of criminals walking in and out and I have to go through the magnetometers, like they do, and I'm wearing a gun and the deputies that the deputies that work the magnetometers know that I'm undercover cop and they'll try to wave me through. And all these criminals are watching me get waved through and I'm like, so I would scout it out and then try to look down the hallway and when there's nobody waiting in line, then I'd scout them out in the hallway to try to go through, so people wouldn't see me walk them through and not getting checked. It's not a great setup, to be brutally honest. I have another partner who's an ATF, who's a fed, and they did everything completely different. It was way better backstop than what we did, you know, but we rolled with the punches, I guess.
Speaker 1:Thank you for joining me on Behind the Thin Blue Line, where I have conversations with current and former police officers and they get to tell their stories. I hope you've enjoyed that episode. In the next episode, we'll again explore the human side of policing through more conversations with police officers from around the world. Please make sure you subscribe to the podcast so you never miss an episode. So you never miss an episode. Lastly, if you're a current or former police officer, I would love to chat to you about your experiences or, if you're feeling dangerous, tell your stories on my podcast. Please get in contact by my email, which is whisperintheshadowspodcast at gmailcom. I look forward to you joining me next week.
