> ## Content Index > Fetch the complete content index at: https://www.smdp.com/llms.txt > Use this file to discover other available public pages before exploring further. # Born to ride along - URL: https://www.smdp.com/born-to-ride-along/ - Published: 2008-05-05T15:00:00.000Z - Updated: 2026-10-24T19:27:46.000Z - Author: Kevin Herrera - Tags: Crime, Santa Monica, #archive-import, Homeless *FROM RIDE PAGE 3 Working the beat is serious business* Editor’s note: For the next two weeks, Editor in Chief Kevin Herrera will be writing a first-person account of what it’s like to be enrolled in the Santa Monica Police Department’s Citizen Police Academy, which is intended to foster better communication between Santa Monicans and police officers, while giving residents a better understanding of what it takes to preserve the peace. CITYWIDE So much for that ride along curse that I kept hearing about. While Santa Monica Police Department’s Officer Richard “Ricky” Verbeck and I didn’t run into any serious trouble, nor make any arrests during my ride along Friday night (and I’m happy we didn’t because of all the paperwork that follows), we, or should I say he, did some quality police work, handing out traffic tickets for running stop signs, helping a young woman get treatment after expressing suicidal thoughts, reuniting a man with his lost pit bull, and busting an apologetic homeless man for urinating in public. We were pretty much booked from beginning to end, responding to various calls for service while also having the time to do some proactive police work. In all, we were productive, helping keep the streets safe for all of us, at least for one night. GETTING READY TO ROLL The shift started with roll call. Officers working night watch (4 p.m. to 2 a.m.) gathered in a briefing room with their superiors to get up to speed on the latest crimes that occurred that day or that week, along with arrests made, crime trends and statistics. It was like a professional sports team in their locker room, going over the Xs and Os before the big game, except here, every game is big. Officers leave the Public Safety Facility not knowing if they will return. There was an early morning sweep along the beach. Several people were cited for camping. Some crimes are up, including rapes and murders (two deaths, up 100 percent from last year), while the majority are down double digits, providing hope that the crime rate will continue to be the lowest it’s been in the last 50 years. Percentages may raise alarm, especially when considering the two murders we’ve had this year, but when looking at the base numbers it is clear that Santa Monica is a safe city. And that’s with the city by the sea being attached at the left hip to Los Angeles, which has been dreadfully dubbed the murder capital of the nation in recent years and has witnessed over 80 murders so far this year. After viewing photos of those arrested, a few jokes cracked at their expense, the officers dispersed. I was led to an office so that I could sign a waiver and receive my “Citizen Observer” name tag. From there I met up with Verbeck, 28, a six year veteran who grew up in Santa Monica as the son of a police officer, spending much of his childhood at the station and around the boys in blue. It was those experiences and the camaraderie his father had with his fellow officers that led Verbeck to put a career in computers on hold to pursue his lifelong dream of working patrol. “It’s not about the money,” Verbeck said, explaining why he passed up on careers that could have paid more than a life in law enforcement.“I like helping people. Every day you can go home at the end of the day and say,‘I made a difference in someone’s life.’” Case in point, a few weeks ago Verbeck and his partner were eating lunch at Bubba Gumps on the Santa Monica Pier when they received a call about a kid who wasn’t breathing. The two left their meal and ran to the scene. They met with a mother who was hysterical. Her baby boy,“Little Jessie,” 15 months, was choking on a churro. He wasn’t breathing. Verbeck turned the boy around and gave him a few back blows while using his fingers to clean out the kid’s moth, tossing bits of churro to the ground. “I don’t necessarily care for the sound of a baby crying, but when he started whimpering, I was like ‘Thank God,’” Verbeck said. “You don’t realize it at the time, but later on you think, ‘Wow, I just saved a baby’s life.’ It feels really good.” Verbeck and I had met twice before, the first time being the day I spent hanging out at Will Rogers Park with the SMPD’s Mounted Unit. Verbeck was in training, learning how to maintain control over his horse as he ran through a series of movements needed to hold his own in a crowd. The second time we met,Verbeck, a training officer who specializes in defensive tactics, played a drunk who had to pee, jumping out of a parked car during a mock traffic stop, forcing me to pull my weapon out of fear. He likes to bring that up. “You almost shot me for going to the bathroom,” he said with a laugh. He’s a cool cat,a dedicated officer who likes to work in the trenches and knows how to have fun doing it. He’s got a reputation for being a good cop, which put me at ease. I was worried that I might have to spend the next six or eight hours with someone who was guarded and unwilling to communicate. That’s not Verbeck. He’s open, honest and likes to laugh, so right away I knew we were in good shape. We walked to our squad car, checked the electronics and the rest of our equipment to make sure everything was functioning properly. Aside from a camera that records when an officer goes a certain speed or flips on his or her lights, the car comes equipped with a computer system that includes a touch-screen and keyboard, allowing officers to enter in license plates, drivers license numbers and scan through calls for service. We also checked our weapons, a shotgun with hard-hitting slugs and an assault rifle. When everything is in order, we head out for a night of crime fighting. “This is right where I want to be, so I couldn’t be happier,”Verbeck said of patrol as he drove east on Colorado Avenue, just passing Santa Monica Place. “I work with a great group of officers, hard workers … We’re a close group. After work sometimes, we get together at someone’s house, kick back and have a good time. These aren’t just people you work with, they become your friends.” As for Night Watch, Verbeck loves it. It is the time of day that allows the officers to not only answer calls for service, but to be more proactive in their approach as they hit hot spots looking for anything suspicious. “You get all types of calls,”Verbeck said of Night Watch. “It’s early enough in the day that if there is a bank robbery, we can get involved. Then it folds into the nighttime when we get plenty of calls, street robberies, narcotics, burglaries … You get more of the serious offenses. During Day Watch, you are answering call after call after call and you don’t have that time for that self initiated type of work.” For Verbeck that means checking on alleys where he knows heroin users like to shoot up, or parking near a stop sign at the entrance to the 1550 beach parking lot, catching drivers who fail to obey the stop signs, putting the lives of bike riders at risk as they roll by on the bike path. We did both. Working night watch isn’t for everyone. The hours can be tough, especially for those with families. For Verbeck it works just fine. His wife is in medical school and is busy studying most nights. The two can wake up late, hit the gym and have lunch together before he heads to the station. It doesn’t take long before we get our first call. A man with a metal pipe has allegedly been threatening people inside a business on Wilshire Boulevard near 28th Street. Verbeck hits the sirens and slams on the accelerator,the V-8 engine roaring as we speed past motorists. “You never blow through intersections,” Verbeck said as he slowed down near the corner of Colorado Avenue and Lincoln Boulevard. “You’d be surprised how many people just don’t hear the siren or don’t pay attention to it.” We get there in about a minute, and find several other officers on scene and a black man, who looked to be homeless, in handcuffs sitting on the ground. The situation is under control, so we jump back in our squad car and continue to cruise. We drive toward Downtown to Verbeck’s beat, Beat 1, which covers everything west of Pacific Coast Highway. That’s when we receive a call about a man yelling at people passing by. We get the description on the computer and start looking along Ocean Avenue. We spotted the suspect near Santa Monica Boulevard and Ocean. It’s an older white gentleman with even whiter hair. He looked lost. Verbeck and another officer questioned him. He said his name is Michael and he’s originally from Cincinnati where he worked as a machinist. The officers searched him and sat him down on the sidewalk so they could chat. After a few minutes and a stern warning, they let the man go. “This job really makes you appreciate what you have,” Verbeck said as he drove to the next call, a young woman reportedly distraught and contemplating suicide. On the computer screen it said she’s a cutter. When we arrive we meet up with five or so officers who are talking with the woman. She seemed fine, perhaps a little groggy from some sleeping pills she took earlier. The officers handcuffed her for her own safety and transported her to a local hospital for observation. We leave and head over to an alley just off Olympic Boulevard and 20th Street. Verbeck wants to check up on an old friend, a homeless man named Jonny, one of Verbeck’s success stories. Jonny, an Latino man with a shaved head and tattoos, was a drunk about three years ago, Verbeck said. He would constantly run into Jonny and his drinking buddies, who would pound beers in the alley. Verbeck would constantly cite them, but after a few months, he realized that wasn’t working. So instead, Verbeck began pouring out their beer. Nearly every day he would do this, all the while pleading with Jonny to give it up. Finally, after getting frustrated with having his beer dumped, Jonny put the booze down and started on the road to recovery. When we met up with him, he said he’s been sober for quite some time and was working construction in Los Angeles. He seemed grateful for Verbeck’s help and showed him his new dog. “You really helped me out,” Jonny told Verbeck. “You set me straight.” The two shook hands and we left. “If I can help make a difference with at least one of these guys, that’s good,” Verbeck said as we headed back to the beach. While rolling on Ocean Front Walk, we spotted five Latino males dressed in baggy jeans and long T-shirts smoking what appeared to be a joint. Verbeck rolled over slowly, got out of the car and called for back up before approaching the men, who were not too pleased to be stopped. They started talking back to Verbeck, who kept his cool despite the chatter. “I came at you with respect,”Verbeck told them, getting the attention of one guy who told his friends to shut up and listen to what Verbeck had to say. The guys wanted to know why they were stopped. Verbeck told them it was because they were smoking on the beach and walking on the bike path, both violations of the municipal code. Verbeck searched them and ran a few names through his computer while two other officers stood chatting with the group, cracking jokes about their baggy pants as they laughed at one officer’s tight trousers. It seemed that a tense situation turned quickly as they all laughed, exchanged some daps and went on their way. It turned out what we thought was a joint was a cigarette on of them rolled.While he could have cited them for smoking, Verbeck choose not to, letting them walk off into the sunset. As we rolled through the 1550 lot, our heads on a swivel scanning the lines of parked cars as the sound of laughter and the surf spilled into the patrol car, Verbeck turned to me and assumed the reporter role, asking me how long I’ve been writing and how our chosen professions seemed to relate, both of us always on the lookout for something out of the ordinary, both professions respected, but often criticized. We spoke briefly about our families, his mother having just called to say hello, and presumably to check up on him like all mothers do. “I love you,” she said with that tone that touches every man and makes them remember when they were young and vulnerable. “I love you, too,” Verbeck said as he hung up his cell phone and continued through the parking lot. Up and over a concrete parking block and into an adjacent lot we went. Verbeck shined the high beam at a car that pulled into a parking space. The lot closes at sunset and Verbeck wanted to let them know so they wouldn’t have to be towed later. He was also being proactive, looking to keep his lots free of anything that might turn into a problem later. It turned out that the driver wanted to leave, but their key broke in the ignition. We left them, knowing that we would have to come back later to check up on them. The rest of the night was clam. We pulled over a driver for illegally tinted windows and because his brake lights weren’t working. Verbeck wrote him a ticket and we pushed on. There was a call about a possible domestic disturbance, so we headed over to 26th Street and Pico Boulevard to investigate. It turns out a couple had too much to drink and were involved in an argument, the boyfriend punching a cabinet and mirror, cutting his hand. “Just normal, fun couple problems,” the girlfriend said. Seeing that the situation was under control, we rolled out. It was nearing 10:30 p.m. and it was about time to call it a night for me. Verbeck still had another three and a half hours left. I was told that the officers would probably prefer it if you left before the shift was up, so I wanted to oblige. Verbeck dropped me off in front of my office. We shook hands and I thanked him for the ride. I left feeling as if I learned a lot about the working lives of these officers and what it takes to do the job right. It felt good. But not all days are like this. Sometimes you see things that haunt you, like the time Verbeck held an elderly man as he took his last breath, the victim of a car accident on Idaho Avenue last year. It was hard for him to let go of the memory of the man’s face as his life slipped away. That was one of the few times Verbeck called his wife to talk about what he had seen. For the most part, officers have to process things and move on. It helps to not take anything too seriously. “Humor is key in this line of work,” Verbeck said.“If you can’t laugh most of this stuff off, then you’re in trouble.” *Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on May 5, 2008.* [Read the original PDF.](https://s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/smdp%5Fbackissues/050508.pdf?ref=smdp.com)