By Mike Simmons
“It’s a bird…it’s a plane…it’s Superman!”
Sgt. Al Fryer has done it all. He worked in Patrol, Field Training, Tac Squad, Investigations, the SWAT team…all of it!
Plus, all the bad guys knew, “If Fryer starts chasing you, you might as well stop, because he is going to catch you.” He was like a machine. He ran and ran and ran, until he caught his man. And he never backed down – from anything. If there was a fight, he was headed towards it, no matter the distance. I’ll say this…I was always glad Al was on my side. I was equally as happy that he wasn’t on the other side.
Picture this: I was working on the Tac Squad with Al and others. We had a warrant for a suspect on the west side of town. I had an informant who agreed to – for payment – point out who the guy was by walking with him down Strong Street at 6:00 PM later that evening. When I saw my guy walking with the bad guy, I would call in for the catch. Got it. So far, so good.
Except that I had Al with me.
Sure enough, when 6:00 came, I saw my guy walking with another guy. I called on the radio, “Okay, that’s him. Let’s go. From all sides, we descended on the two. The bad guy ran right and the good guy ran left, in order to keep up appearances that he didn’t snitch. I chased the bad guy and made a tackle on him around the corner from where he was first seen. Good job.
Then I hear Al call my number on the radio, “232, do you want us to go ahead and take him to jail?”
Huh? I had the bad guy in front of me. As we were speaking, I was putting the suspect in the back of a marked cruiser to be transported to the county jail. I didn’t understand what Al was talking about.
Then it dawned on me…he chased and caught my informant! Not wanting him identified over the radio, I asked Al, “What does he look like?”
“I don’t know. His face is in the dirt.”
I thought to myself, This guy won’t ever want to work with me again! I jumped in my unmarked car and flew around the corner. I saw Al, standing over my prone, handcuffed informant like he had shot a buck in the Blackwater Forest. The guy was screaming that he was in pain! I jumped out of the car and said, “Al, that’s my CI (confidential informant)! He’s a good guy! Let him up! Why is he screaming?”
“Probably because his face is in an ant bed,” he said without emotion.
I gasped slightly, looked at him in horror, and jumped down to help him up. Sure enough, he was covered in fire ants!
I uncuffed him, helped him brush off the ants, and apologized profusely about his treatment, explaining that my partner thought he was the bad guy.
I called the sergeant over to give me the informant money, hoping it would compensate for the mixup. I took the envelope from the sergeant and gave it to my guy. He hurriedly opened it, hoping to see his reward. I great big huge $5 bill. I thanked him and sent him on his way. Funny, he never contacted me again about being an informant. He probably wanted hazard pay.
You see, Al was like a police K9 – if you run, I am going to chase, and you will lose.
That was Al.