False Alarm

One night I was driving behind the two crappiest bars is town. I ran the plate on a car going the other way, and it came back as stolen. I fell in behind it, and called it in. Dispatch confirmed the stolen hit, so I asked for backup before I attempted a stop.

As I was following, the driver of the stolen kept slowing way down - and at one point even stopped - and was leaning out of the window, gesturing me to come talk to him. It goes without saying that there was no way that was going to happen. I didn't even have my emergency lights on yet, and this yutz knows I'm following him and wants me to come talk to him. No. He continued driving through a residential area, periodically slowing down or stopping, waving at me, then driving off when I refused to get out of my squad.

Finally, the cavalry arrived. Once we were all in position, I hit the lights and we did a felony stop on the guy. I remember that he exited the car with hands up, as instructed, but he had an object between his right thumb and forefinger. In silhouette, it looked exactly like a gun barrel sticking up. Before things could go too wrong, he dropped it. It was his wallet.

It turned out, the guy was driving his own car. He had reported it stolen earlier in the day, then didn't bother to let the police know he got it back.

This is how people get hurt.