Free Lines and shadows by Joseph Wambaugh Page B
Authors: Joseph Wambaugh
charade, and more than satisfied that these pollos were pluckable, one of the bandits walked up to Eddie Cervantes and introduced himself in a manner that the cop had never before experienced.
Eddie Cervantes had sad eyes that turned down at the Corners. He was short enough to be the brunt of all the munchkin jokes, and his gung-ho Marine haircut was boyish. He looked perhaps the easiest for the bandits to intimidate. The bandit merely smiled and brought a blade straight up, glinting in the moonlight. Without warning he grabbed Eddie Cervantes by the throat and whispered in his face, " Hórale, cabróne ." That quickly. To be grabbed by the throat. To be staring at a blade. No by-your-leave. No how-about-a-cigarette? No foreplay.
file://C:\Documents and Settings\tim\Desktop\books to read\Wambaugh, Joseph - Lines a... 11/20/2009
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The cops would learn about bandit styles. The style of this trio was to intimidate through violence, not just the threat of violence. The goateed bandit swung the heavily buckled belt he'd just stolen from Lino Ariza at the face of Manny Lopez.
The bandits could not have been more surprised. There was a hell of a lot of yelling and screaming when Manny whipped out his two-inch revolver, and as it later said in the arrest report, his bandit "suffered a slight injury to his forehead as he struggled for the weapon." Which, translated into regular English, meant that Manny Lopez smacked him right between the freaking eyes.
Eddie Cervantes did not use his weapon. It happened instantly. The flash of steel, the hand at his throat. Manny yelled something, the gun cracking the bandit between the horns. Eddie Cervantes had his gun in his hand but instinctively grabbed for the knife. He kicked his bandit's balls, clear up around his head rag.
The arrest report would also say, "Only the force necessary to effect the arrests was used by the arresting officers."
But these three bandits got a whole lot of lumps. They were the first real bandits the cops had encountered. And they had scared the living shit out of Eddie Cervantes. And people who are scared often play catch-up.
The fact is that after Eddie Cervantes threw a shoulder into his bandit and knocked him flat and pounced on him and beat the living crap out of him, he was still very tense and very mad. He shoved his snub-nosed revolver into the teeth of the bandit and said, "I could kill you right now!"
And it dawned on him. He could! Out in these canyons, in the darkness, with the others still handcuffing and wrestling and beating the hell out of the other two, he could kill this bandit right now. His hands were shaking. He had never fired his gun outside of target practice.
"I could kill you right now!" he repeated, bumping the bandit's teeth with his gun muzzle.
"Don't kill me, ' mano!" the bandit pleaded. "Don't kill me!"
"I could, you son of a bitch!" Eddie Cervantes said. "I could!" But he didn't.
"We were afraid to use our guns at first," he would later say. "We were still normal policemen."
At about the time that Eddie Cervantes was flossing the bandit's teeth with his gun muzzle, the other teams found a brace of dazed and bewildered pollos not a hundred file://C:\Documents and Settings\tim\Desktop\books to read\Wambaugh, Joseph - Lines a... 11/20/2009
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Page 42 of 256
yards away in the darkness. One of them had a knife wound on his throat and a contusion on his forehead where he had been smashed by a rock. Lino Ariza and his party were driven to the substation, where they identified the bandits who had robbed them. Lino Ariza told the cops that he would give one leg and one arm if he could just make enough money to survive in Durango. He didn't see how a person could ever be happy in such a violent country as America.
When Tony Puente got home that night from the beer party to celebrate the bandit bust, he was hoping that his wife, Dene, would be awake. When he wanted something badly enough, he'd hope for
Eddie Cervantes had sad eyes that turned down at the Corners. He was short enough to be the brunt of all the munchkin jokes, and his gung-ho Marine haircut was boyish. He looked perhaps the easiest for the bandits to intimidate. The bandit merely smiled and brought a blade straight up, glinting in the moonlight. Without warning he grabbed Eddie Cervantes by the throat and whispered in his face, " Hórale, cabróne ." That quickly. To be grabbed by the throat. To be staring at a blade. No by-your-leave. No how-about-a-cigarette? No foreplay.
file://C:\Documents and Settings\tim\Desktop\books to read\Wambaugh, Joseph - Lines a... 11/20/2009
dummy1
Page 41 of 256
The cops would learn about bandit styles. The style of this trio was to intimidate through violence, not just the threat of violence. The goateed bandit swung the heavily buckled belt he'd just stolen from Lino Ariza at the face of Manny Lopez.
The bandits could not have been more surprised. There was a hell of a lot of yelling and screaming when Manny whipped out his two-inch revolver, and as it later said in the arrest report, his bandit "suffered a slight injury to his forehead as he struggled for the weapon." Which, translated into regular English, meant that Manny Lopez smacked him right between the freaking eyes.
Eddie Cervantes did not use his weapon. It happened instantly. The flash of steel, the hand at his throat. Manny yelled something, the gun cracking the bandit between the horns. Eddie Cervantes had his gun in his hand but instinctively grabbed for the knife. He kicked his bandit's balls, clear up around his head rag.
The arrest report would also say, "Only the force necessary to effect the arrests was used by the arresting officers."
But these three bandits got a whole lot of lumps. They were the first real bandits the cops had encountered. And they had scared the living shit out of Eddie Cervantes. And people who are scared often play catch-up.
The fact is that after Eddie Cervantes threw a shoulder into his bandit and knocked him flat and pounced on him and beat the living crap out of him, he was still very tense and very mad. He shoved his snub-nosed revolver into the teeth of the bandit and said, "I could kill you right now!"
And it dawned on him. He could! Out in these canyons, in the darkness, with the others still handcuffing and wrestling and beating the hell out of the other two, he could kill this bandit right now. His hands were shaking. He had never fired his gun outside of target practice.
"I could kill you right now!" he repeated, bumping the bandit's teeth with his gun muzzle.
"Don't kill me, ' mano!" the bandit pleaded. "Don't kill me!"
"I could, you son of a bitch!" Eddie Cervantes said. "I could!" But he didn't.
"We were afraid to use our guns at first," he would later say. "We were still normal policemen."
At about the time that Eddie Cervantes was flossing the bandit's teeth with his gun muzzle, the other teams found a brace of dazed and bewildered pollos not a hundred file://C:\Documents and Settings\tim\Desktop\books to read\Wambaugh, Joseph - Lines a... 11/20/2009
dummy1
Page 42 of 256
yards away in the darkness. One of them had a knife wound on his throat and a contusion on his forehead where he had been smashed by a rock. Lino Ariza and his party were driven to the substation, where they identified the bandits who had robbed them. Lino Ariza told the cops that he would give one leg and one arm if he could just make enough money to survive in Durango. He didn't see how a person could ever be happy in such a violent country as America.
When Tony Puente got home that night from the beer party to celebrate the bandit bust, he was hoping that his wife, Dene, would be awake. When he wanted something badly enough, he'd hope for
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