Confessions of a Police Constable by Matt Delito

Meanwhile, Jeff had ducked away from the door again, except this time it was to laugh, not to throw up. He was one of the people who had cheered on my impersonation of Mrs 71.
    â€˜Jeff,’ 71 barked. ‘Come help Delito with this body.’
    We had to place Mr Bloggs on his back in order to search him properly. Once we’d both put on gloves, Jeff moved the chair out of the way and took the body under one arm, whilst I picked up his other arm.
    â€˜Onto his back,’ I said. ‘Slowly. One … Two …’
    We moved him on three, but the side of his head seemed to stick to the radiator. I watched the skin of his face stretch, ever so slowly, until finally it gave way. The dead man’s head flopped back with a crunch. My eyes were glued to the radiator, where a disturbingly large amount of cheek skin was still sticking to the metal. Jeff let go of his side and leapt from the room. I dropped my side of the body as well, and the man hit the carpet with a thud.
    The combination of the cheek stuck on the radiator and the sound of Jeff retching pushed me over the edge. I moved towards the doorway, but found my way blocked by Jeff, who had thrown up on 71’s leg. I decided to take my hat off, and leave my lunch in it instead. I should have known Burger King would be a bad idea.

Bringing them back from the dead
    Usually, we find out about traffic incidents over the radio. Either someone dials 999, or CCTV cameras pick up weird traffic movements and discover that two finely engineered boxes of iron and plastic have reduced each other to a set of insurance claims, and their drivers and passengers to ‘casualties’.
    However, I once drove by the scene of one accident just as it happened. My friend Kim, who also happened to be my operator that day, and I had just finished with an incredibly grievous case of a sudden death caused by a drugs overdose. As I pulled out of a junction, a motorcyclist who had been thrown from his bike came skidding past us.
    We immediately stopped our car – blue lights blazing – using it to block the road, and got out to see what had happened.
    â€˜He’s not breathing,’ Kim said, once she had run over to him and flipped his visor open. ‘I don’t think he’s breathing!’
    I checked the road quickly; our vehicle was holding back any traffic from coming our way, which would have to do in terms of protecting us.
    To be able to do fully effective CPR 21 , you usually also need to be able to give rescue breaths. To do that, you need access to the patient’s mouth, and you’ll be unsurprised to hear that a full-face motorcycle helmet doesn’t really help in that respect.
    It is commonly believed that you should never remove a motorcyclist’s helmet if he’s been in an accident. As a general rule, that is true; motorcycle accidents have a high rate of spinal and head injuries, and removing the helmet can cause further injury to the spinal column. However, in many cases, you don’t have the luxury of a choice: if someone stops breathing they have, at most, four minutes before they start suffering brain damage. They need CPR, which means the helmet has to come off –
pronto
.
    I quickly got on my radio to get some more help.
    â€˜Mike Delta receiving?’
    â€˜Go ahead.’
    â€˜I need LAS on the hurry-up. IC1 male, aged around forty, has come off a motorbike. He’s not breathing or responding, but no obvious injuries. No other casualties.’
    â€˜Received. LAS on the way. What’s his status?’
    â€˜Not sure, we’re starting ELS 22 now!’ I barked back and cut the line. A bit rude, perhaps, but I didn’t really have time for chit-chatting with the radio operator.
    An ambulance was on its way, which meant that we would only have to deal with this fellow on our own for about 15 minutes at most.
    Kim and I started the painfully slow process of taking his helmet off. We undid