A Little Halloween Humor

About two decades ago, while working for another police department, I was dispatched to a residence to do a welfare check on the woman who lived there. Her son had called in and said that his sister had called him, telling him that she had taken food to the house, but could not get their mother to come to the door. He further reported that he was at the house, but could not get their mother to the door, nor could he get into the house.

My Lieutenant and I arrived at the house, and spoke with the woman’s son. He said that his mother was elderly, lived alone and couldn’t go anywhere by herself. When asked if she could have gone somewhere with a friend or neighbor, he said that she never went anywhere. We checked all of the doors and windows, and found only one small window beside the back door that was unlocked. The window was about two feet wide and would only open about two feet. The Lieutenant looked at me – standing six foot three with four foot wide shoulders – like he was expecting me to just slide right through the opening. We both laughed at that thought. The woman’s son was the only one small enough to fit through the opening, and I told him to go in and come straight to the door to let us in. Once he did that I told him to wait outside while the Lieutenant and I checked the residence. I did this for two reasons; one, because I didn’t want him to freak out and go crazy if she was in there dead and two, if it turned out to be a crime scene, it needed to be preserved as much as possible.

Well…we entered the residence and started looking around. Even though it was the middle of the day the house was dark due to heavy curtains being closed in parts of the house and windows being boarded over in other parts. As I was approaching the master bedroom, the beam from my flashlight washed over a bare leg, hanging off the side of the bed. I told my Lieutenant that I had found the resident. It didn’t look good. Aside from the one leg hanging off the bed, the rest of the woman was fully clothed and laying back on the bed. I said her name, but got no reply. I spoke louder and the LT also called her name. Nothing!

Now…I know what you’re saying. You’re saying, “Jim! The title of this post is ‘A Little Halloween Humor’. What’s funny about finding a dead woman in her home?! Keep reading, dear friends.

I told the Lieutenant that I was going to check for a pulse and he flipped on the light switch and came over beside me. Just as I touched her wrist, the woman jumped up on the bed and let out a holler that startled me and elicited a yelp from my Lieutenant, followed by him attempting to run through me to get out of that house! As it turned out, the woman was a very hard sleeper and did not sleep with her hearing aids in, which is why she didn’t hear the phone and the knocking on the door. All was well with her. I can’t say the same for my Lieutenant. We laughed about it for a long time after that.

Have a Happy and Safe Halloween, y’all!