Paul Bacon (5 page)

CHAPTER 8

T
WO MONTHS INTO OUR recruit semester, we left the academy in downtown Manhattan for ten nights at the NYPD Outdoor Firearms
and Tactics Range in the East Bronx. The place where we would learn our most controversial skill was a low-slung compound
built on a forested peninsula in Long Island Sound, as far from prying eyes as one could get in the five boroughs. The entrance
to the range stood at the end of an unmarked and unlit road bordered by thick woodlands. Visiting the place at night gave
me a sense of being swallowed up. Out on the peninsula, nearly twenty thousand rounds of live ammunition were fired every
night, hammering out for hours at a time. It was hardly what I called a pleasant learning environment.

That was before I fell in love. My change of heart took place in the range’s two-hundred-seat main classroom, a one-story
metal building in the center of the camp that looked like a giant toolshed. Inside, it looked just like the academy: cement
floor, long rows of metal school desks, and safety propaganda covering every flat surface. This was real NYPD chic. In the
movies, police facilities were decorated with mug shots of desperate-looking criminals, but in my experience, the most common
sight was the large, department-approved safety message.

Set in giant capital letters and always followed by at least one exclamation point, these lifesaving reminders were the visual
equivalent of a large man with a megaphone. They came in full-size poster form, and also on little fluorescent-green stickers
that seemed capable of multiplying on their own. Like a prudent fungus, the messages sprouted on the sides of lockers and
filing cabinets, on computers and fax machines, on cell doors and toilet stalls. Wherever we went, a sticker was imploring
us to TREAT EVERY GUN AS IF IT WERE LOADED!, DEMAND TO SEE HANDS!!, CUFF, then FRISK!, and, in the one phrase that always
made me feel as if some object was about to come flying at my head, TAKE COVER!!!

On our first day at the range, six recruit companies took seats in the classroom, then three members from each were selected
to fetch our new guns from an outbuilding. The rest of us sat and squirmed in our seats as quietly as possible. This was the
shining moment we’d been waiting for.

A month earlier, the NYPD had gathered our company in the academy auditorium to let us pick which handgun we’d be carry ing
with us on patrol. Up to that point, I had never envisioned myself holding a sidearm of any kind, much less comparison shopping
for one. I thought all handguns were equally revolting. Gun control was my wedge issue. Left or right, I couldn’t understand
why anyone worried about violent crime would want to put more handguns on the streets, nor could I fathom why anyone would
want to own one in the first place.

But now I had no choice. Or rather, I’d have a choice between three nine-millimeter models: the full-size Smith & Wesson,
which looked like Dirty Harry might carry it; the midsize Sig Sauer, which had the same appearance; and the lightweight Glock,
which looked like a water gun. During firearm selection, the range instructors had told us only the weapons’ respective weights
and sizes, saying nothing about reliability or accuracy. However, before they made us choose the pistols, they let us handle
each one and see what we liked. This was not a casual first date; according to NYPD regulations, the handgun you picked first
would be yours for the rest of your career. Like that ill-advised biker tattoo, you would have years to regret the wrong choice.

I’d had no idea what I might or might not like in a gun, and after waiting in line for hours, I had about thirty seconds to
decide. The trigger on the Sig Sauer felt a little hard to pull, which seemed to bode poorly for my chances of surviving a
gunfight. On the other hand, the force required to engage the Glock’s patented two-piece “safety trigger” could be achieved
by a light breeze. Shooting from the hip was not on my agenda, so the Glock was out. In between them was the Smith & Wesson.
When I picked it up, the trigger felt perfectly tailored to the inside groove of my finger. I knew my choice had been made
with one gratifying
click
of metal on metal. I handed it back to the instructor with a weird little twinge.

Now, a month later in the Bronx, my new pistol was hand-delivered in its own personalized case. We’d been told not to so much
as breathe on the cases until they were all distributed, so I could only stare down at the blue box and wonder how I would
greet its occupant. Would I be frightened? Would I be repulsed? Before the instructor let us open our boxes, I expected anything
other than what I felt.

Sitting on a bed of dark-gray foam was the most radiant and powerful-looking thing I’d ever laid eyes on: a finely buffed
stainless-steel hand cannon sparkling under the classroom lights like a deadly jewel. It looked bigger than I remembered,
like it could take down a helicopter with one shot. Before this moment, if I had heard the word
gun
, my mind would have instantly free-associated a string of other distasteful terms like
violence
,
danger
, and
stupidity
. Now, I could only think of one word:
MINE
.

Slowly and quietly, I reached down to touch my new gun.

“I repeat! Open the case, but
do not
touch the firearm!” the instructor shouted into his microphone. My head snapped up. I thought I was busted, but I was apparently
not the only recruit with a hearing problem. The instructor’s words were booming across a roomful of would be assassins.

Sitting next to me, my friend Bill Peters didn’t seem quite as excited about his new gun. Bill had chosen the Glock. In addition
to being appreciably smaller than the Smith & Wesson, the Glock was made out of a dull black alloy called Tenifer, which made
it look like plastic. Bill gazed over at my weapon, then back down at his own. “I should have picked the Smith,” he said with
a sigh.

Bill looked truly unhappy, and I might have tried to talk him out of his buyer’s remorse if I hadn’t been waiting for chances
to kick him when he was down. This was because Bill hadn’t given me a moment’s rest since the semester began. He seemed to
think I was too laid-back to be a cop, and when he found out I’d once lived in California and had voted for Al Gore in 2000,
he vehemently warned me away from the job, claiming that I was a danger to myself and others. I attributed Bill’s needling
friendship style to his being from the Northeast—Long Island in particular, where the wise-guy mentality of the city met the
dumb-guy mentality of the suburbs. Wherever the Bugs Bunny impersonation came from, it was the prevailing disposition of the
NYPD, and it was starting to rub off on me. When I got an opening like this, I couldn’t resist.

“How much ammo does that thing hold?” I asked Bill.

Bill turned to me with narrowed eyes. “Sixteen rounds. Just like yours,” he said cautiously. “Why?”

“Then where does the CO2 cartridge go?” I said with a confused look—as if his weapon was designed for paintball.

For the briefest moment, Bill looked just as confused himself. “What the? Oh, fuck you, you prick.”

I’d never picked up a handgun before in my life, but I scored 94 percent at the target range after one day of practice, ranking
second in my company behind Moran, an army-trained marksman. To my surprise, I found that hitting a large, stationary object
with a semiautomatic weapon wasn’t all that hard. It was like taking a photograph—you just point and shoot. Oddly, though,
even from the cozy seven-yard mark, most of my classmates scattered their fire around the human-shaped silhouettes as if they
were trying to miss. And when we moved back to the twenty-five-yard position, their shots whizzed right over the stanchions,
sending up little puffs of dust as they made impact with the enormous dirt mound behind the target line.

A few days of practice and individual instruction brought nearly everyone up to speed on the mechanics of shooting. We got
all the help we could ask for in this department, but the legality of the instincts we were honing was given short shrift.
From what I could piece together from a number of partial explanations, “Shoot to stop” was the NYPD’s new official mantra
for gunfire situations, replacing the nasty old “Shoot to kill.” This seemed better. Rather than wantonly gunning down everybody
who seemed like he might be a perp, we’d simply
stop
him. Wait up, sir; I’d like to have a word with you, if you wouldn’t mind.

But when I first got a look at our target silhouettes, I started to wonder. Smack in the middle of the silhouette’s chest
was a six-inch circle designated “center of mass,” which the instructors told us to target at all times. Shooting someone
in the center of his chest suggested something more than stopping power. This was killing power, which seemed inconsistent
with the whole protect-and-serve business. So during dinner break one evening, I walked back into the main classroom and approached
a range instructor about this seeming contradiction.

“I’m a little unclear about something. Can I ask you a question?” I said to the instructor, a man in his forties with dark-brown
hair parted in the middle and feathered on the sides. He was sitting by himself with a half-eaten cheese sandwich in his hand
and a can of Coke in the other.

“Do your worst,” the instructor said, then took a bite of his sandwich.

“If we’re supposed to
shoot to stop
,” I said, “shouldn’t we be aiming at the silhouette’s arms or legs?”

“Don’t shweat it, bro. You get shcored for every shot inshide the shilhouette,” he told me through a mouthful of bread and
cheese. He was a little hard to take seriously.

“That’s actually not my problem,” I said. “I’m just wondering why we aim at center of mass.”

“Becuszh,” he said, swallowing his food and taking a swig of Coke, “that’s the middle of the perp’s chest.”

“Where the heart is,” I said.

“Yep.”

“And the spine.”

“Mm-hmm.”

“Okay, uh . . . won’t that
kill
the perp?”

“What’s your point?”

“I’m not sure anymore.”

“I see where you’re headin’, but try not to think about it too much.
Shoot to stop
means just that, shoot
to stop.
Know what I’m sayin’?”

“Not really. Can you be a little more specific?”

“Yeah, uh,” he said, rubbing the back of his neck. “We ain’t supposed to get no more specific about it. Youze are told stuff
for a reason, and we can’t say nuthin’ else. The job’s real shaky about gun training, because of liability and whatnot.”

I walked back to the cafeteria feeling no closer to my answer than when I’d left. Mulling the oddities of NYPD regulations,
I nearly bumped into something even odder. Out of the darkness came a tall, thin man in a bright-orange jumpsuit carry ing
a push broom. While he looked like a janitor for NASA, he was actually a trustee from the nearby state prison. We’d been told
to expect these guys, who were inexplicably bused into the weapons compound to perform odd jobs, but the scheme had sounded
so unbelievable that I thought it was urban legend. Allowing convicted criminals to wander unsupervised through a world-class
armory and rub shoulders with untrained police officers transcended the very concept of dumb. It turned out to be standard
operating procedure.

Despite my apprehension, my first encounter with a real-life convict went swimmingly. The man walked right by me, politely
avoiding eye contact, and disappeared again. The last I saw of him were the large reflective letters on the back of his jumpsuit:
DEPARTMENT OF CORRECTIONS.

Back in the range cafeteria, I rejoined my dinner circle and brought up the topic of deadly force. I had grown used to evasive
answers to my questions, but this one was too important to let go. Knowing how to shoot a real person effectively
and
legally seemed worth a bit more research, even if it meant looking like an idiot.

Bill, having suffered my insults over the past few days, was waiting to pay me back. When he heard my dilemma, he put down
his cafeteria-made meatball sandwich and said, “How can a guy so smart be so stupid?”

This caused a few of our friends around the table to snicker, while a recruit named Gustavo, who treated me like a genius
because I let him copy my homework a few times, came to my defense. “You better be able to back your shit up, bro,” he cautioned
Bill. “That’s
Bacon
you’re talking about.”

Bill said, “Well, if
Bacon
can’t figure this one out, God help him when he hits the streets.”

I said, “Will someone just tell me what it means?”

“It means you think too much,” Bill chided me. “It’s only three little words. Shoot to stop.”

“Shoot to stop,” I chanted, hoping this would help. It didn’t.

“What it means,” Gustavo said, “is that shooting a perp in the heat of the moment is mad hard, so aim for the part of his
body that’s easiest to hit—his chest. See what I’m sayin’? Shoot
to stop
the guy.”

“Oh, right,” I said, finally understanding. “As in, not
to miss
him.”

“You got it,” said Gustavo, smiling back at me, as if proud about teaching me something.

As the rest of our bunch lavished me with applause, Bill said, “To hell with Bacon. God help us
all
when he hits the streets.” Cackling, he picked up his hoagie from the table and began lifting it to his mouth.

“Nahhh,” said Gustavo. “Bacon’s gonna do just fine up in the hood. He may be a college boy, but at least he’s got common sense
to not eat food made by convicts.”

Bill froze with his hoagie in midair, then gave Gustavo the evilest of eyes and said, “What are you talking about?”

Gustavo flashed a wry look around the table and said, “Oh, you didn’t know?”

“Know what?” said Bill.

“The cons make the cafeteria food,” said Gustavo.

“I thought they just swept up around the place.”

“They sweep, take out the garbage, clean the toilets. And with the same hands, they make a mean meatball sandwich just for
you, bro. How’s it taste?”