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I stayed on morning watch with Mora and the others for about six months. They requested to keep me there, which was a good fit for me. I admired Mora so much that when he left the department two years later, I traded in my badge number for his to keep his presence on the street in some small way.

About nine months into probation, on September 28, 1986, I made my next contribution to the world: my son Ron, named after my dad, of course. While I was carefully inspecting Ron’s ten fingers and ten toes, his tiny hand grabbed my little finger. It’s difficult to explain the love I felt in that moment. This little person had just come into my life, but I would have died for him. If a four-year-old had come up and tried to hurt him, I’d have punched the kid in the mouth. That’s the kind of love you have for your child when he’s born. He was the cutest, most perfect thing I’d ever seen.

I think all guys want their first child to be a boy, even if they won’t admit it. They want to play catch and put them in Little League and take them to karate or wrestling class. They want that boy to protect his sister, who will be born next. I wanted the experience of teaching my two-year-old son to take a football stance and come at me so I could toughen him up, just as my dad had done with me.

I made it through my one-year probation unfazed and graduated to a full-fledged officer, or P2, then moved to night watch. Everything was going fine for the next few months, until I ran into an issue with a new captain who’d transferred into Southwest. We all called him Nick the Knife because of his awful reputation for stabbing everyone in the back. I thought he wasn’t good at his job, and Southwest went downhill fast because of it.

My partner was accused of mishandling a suspect when we’d been called to a disturbance at a party. The suspect complained that she’d kicked him. Our supervisors both came to us separately, and we told them the truth: yes, we’d stopped the suspect outside the party and searched him, but other than that, nobody had laid a hand on him.

Nick the Knife called me into his office. “If you need to change your story now, you won’t get in trouble,” he said. He obviously didn’t believe us.

I knew he didn’t like my partner. She was a tough cop. Nick didn’t like the fact that she didn’t say nice things about him, so if I altered my story it would clear a path so he could punish her.

Nick tried a variety of ways to persuade me to squeal on my partner for something she hadn’t actually done. He even brought up my dad. “Just because Ron was who he was doesn’t mean you owe it to others to cover up for them.”

He also tried to get something out of me by telling me about an experience he’d once had. “This drunk spat on me,” he said, “and I went to hit him. My partner stopped me and said, ‘We don’t do that.’ He handcuffed him, and you know what? My partner was right, and I was wrong.”

I didn’t know whether I was angrier with being pressured to lie or being forced to listen to his stupid story. “If someone spat on me,” I said, “and I went to do something and my partner tried to stop me, the first thing I’d do is beat the piss out of the person who spat on me. Then I’d beat the piss out of my partner for trying to stop me.” I ripped my badge off and threw it at him. “I don’t want your fucking job. You guys are a bunch of candy asses.”

As I walked out the door, I realized I’d screwed up in a major way. My temper had gotten the best of me. I had more people than just me to think about. I had a wife and son relying on me.

I was immediately suspended for forty days with no pay and had to hand in my badge. My case was sent to a board of rights, a committee that would decide if I got to keep my job. Three captains listened to my testimony, and I ended up getting ten days of unpaid suspension for blowing my lid.

Next I was supposed to report to Hollywood Division to work the Prostitution Enforcement Detail (PED), a special assignment. However, when Bob Taylor, captain of Hollywood Division, found