I drive trucks for a living and work 12 hour shifts conservatively for five days. There are days I park at a rest area and close my eyes in broad daylight but from what I see cops are always very overworked often working shift work. If anything we should encourage their rest because our lives are in their hands.
Why is it such a big deal if a cop is caught sleeping on the job ?
r/AskLE
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Unless you have a partner watching you, sleeping on duty anywhere in public can be dangerous as hell.
We have down room and a few secured lots you could go catch a brief nap on your lunch break time if you were hurting. Just have a partner watch you if you’re not in a secured building.
Cops can work 16+ hours a day just to come back the next day and the next day repeatedly to do another 16+ hour day. Cops cannot sleep on duty because they need to be patrolling and looking for crimes and responding for call. Additionally, cops cannot sleep on duty because they have a significantly higher chance of being ambushed and seriously injured/killed from an ambush than truck drivers or any profession.
Because they’re on the clock. Most jobs frown on that sort of thing.
It’s also dangerous if they’re in their car out on the street without a partner watching their back. Some agencies have cots in the station for naps.
I sleep on the job all the time but I’m in state IT. I don’t see the big deal
IMO, as long as you answer calls, make a couple of contacts, and do your paperwork, if you wanna catch a cat nap, no one will bat an eye. However if you’re sleeping all night shift, ignoring your calls, and not doing anything you get in trouble. Officers should scope out safe sleeping spots to not be caught by the public because in general, it looks bad.
I’ve pitched the idea of 24 hr shifts for smaller agencies where the officers can have back up at night but also sleep when they need to and have 5 days off a week for other gigs or OT or rest
Because you’re getting paid by taxpayers to patrol the area and prevent crime.
It can also be dangerous.
It’s not sleeping, it’s getting CAUGHT sleeping. If you’re not with a buddy, you’re fucking wrong, no if ands or buts. Letting your guard down that much out in the world is unacceptable. I’ve partnered up with my sarge and took turns napping on graves, just make sure someone’s keeping an eye out.
Agreed. There’s a state trooper in my area who parks in the median on the interstate. Sometimes he’ll also park in that triangle shaped void that’s between 2 merging lanes. Every time I pass him in the morning, he’s completely KNOCKED OUT. Head back, mouth wide open.. and I’m not the least mad about it.
YIKES. By yourself and sleeping ? Good way to get dead or on tiktok. Go to the station and take a break if it’s that bad. My guy knew they could come in for a quick 30 if absolutely necessary
Vulnerability and safety. Cops are hurt/killed when they are at their highest level of alertness/vigilance, i.e. traffic stops. So for me, the biggest reason it was a "big deal" was that sleeping on duty greatly increased my chance of being injured or killed, despite how slim of a chance that it could actually happen, I always felt like it would be me. Also the chance of losing my job, or missing a dispatch call, or get caught by a civilian and have it plastered all over. I have worked some very long hours, had eyes crossing and watering, and had to come up with ways to stay awake, but I never in 24 years on the job as an officer and dispatcher, slept in my marked patrol car or during my on-duty time as a dispatcher.
We don’t get paid to sleep. We’re not fire fighters.
It can also be dangerous.
I was an Army MP back in the mid 70’s stationed in Germany. One midnight shift in the middle of the week during the winter months my partner and I pulled into a construction site to finish up some paperwork. We were in an Army jeep (M151a2) with the doors on and our motor pool guys installed a deuce and a half heater in it. There were no radio calls all night and it was an extremely quiet shift. The next thing we know we wake up to a bunch of commotion and find that the sun is up, there are probably 10 Polizei squad cars around us and one of the cops explains that a resident saw both of us slumped over and thought we had been killed. Talk about an embarrassing situation. We apologized to the locals and returned to our base. After I left the Army I had a 27+ year career as an LEO and never even came close to falling asleep, as that incident really stuck with me. I still think that the deuce and a half heater had something to do with it. It made that little jeep so toasty warm.
Who wants to be shot in the face while sleeping. Make it make sense.
It’s condoned. Just don’t do it alone. Always have someone watching over you.