do not do this. i will not take you to jail. but do not do this. i have a family and kids. so do i, sir. okay. i will let you go. it became a worse crime when he actually pulled a gun on me. before that, it was just a basic traffic stop. i swear to god, i will let you go. they will come and get me tomorrow morning, i know. i will not. i will let you gone or your way. i m trying to hit my emergency button on my radio the whole time i m talking to him. when i did that, he looked down at what i m doing. i thought he s going to shoot me. they re checking on me right now. so i need to let them know that you re okay. i didn t think i m that fast that i could take out the threat before he does. i can probably deescalate the situation, i can get him to put the gun down. i m serious, i don t need this. amazingly, rivera does manage to defuse the situation. the driver puts the gun away in his back pocket. and i m like, okay, we can get through this. you know, we ll work through this.
pull the door away far enough so they can both get inside and pull out the driver. that last time before i moved in, we didn t have very much time. [ screams ] we couldn t come straight out a window, we had to go toward the back of the car. i was getting really tired. i remember feeling and twisting just a little bit and he finally moved. finally, he started coming out. i can t breathe. it was like a magic moment occurred. we were able to both get in at the same time, and all of a sudden he moved. whatever had been pinning him wasn t any more. the driver, sean barnes, is badly burned and his legs are on fire when the officers pull him out of the car. 353, please. we ve extracted one. at that point, we re all in the
it was missing earlier? it was missing earlier? officer bermudez sees the driver going for something. she thinks a weapon, so she reaches her arm into the car and the driver panics. but loosen your arm. i know, i know. what are you doing, man? loosen your arm. i know. i am. okay. i knew that if i didn t take action, the possibility that he could come out and assault me or kill me was pretty great. from there, the situation escalates further when the driver takes off with officer bermudez still reaching inside the car. [ screams ] all i remember is hearing the engine rev really loud and the car begin to accelerate really fast, and i m unable to come out of the vehicle. it s a moment of sheer terror
you and i can talk about this. i m going to jail about this. i don t want you to kill yourself. i wanted him to understand that killing yourself is not the answer. that s not the answer for anything. no, do not, do not. but the driver sees no way out. he steps back, takes the gun out of his pocket and puts it to his head. i got a guy with a gun. stop, don t. damn it, don t. i said think of your family, you don t want to do this. drop the gun. don t. come on, don t. shots fired. he s down. send me an ambulance. damn it. the driver dies instantly. within three minutes of rivera s first call, emergency responders arrive on the scene. that s when it all started to hit me, trying to process everything, trying to figure out, why did this happen? so in the days that follow, a calhoun county sheriff s investigation reveals the driver was carrying a stolen handgun and had talked about committing
his wife. be careful. yep. i will. danger is a fact of life for a deputy, especially one who is working the midnight shift. when i was working midnight shift, typically 10 to 12 traffic stops, in the jail two or three times a night, bringing people in, whether for drunk driving, driving under the influence of drugs, warrants, or some type of traffic violation. on january 25th, 2010, one of deputy rivera s stops will take a deadly turn. it s been a routine road patrol. and at 2:45 a.m. he s about to call it a night when he spots a car zooming past his cruiser. i noticed the vehicle swerve without using his turn signal. so that time i kind of got suspicious because if he was going straight, i probably wouldn t have noticed it. rivera thinks the driver could be drunk or high. so he decides to pull him over. he was actually in my mind, he was going to be my last