by frazgo
Arriving at a crime scene is never easy
December 10, 2008 at 10:29 am in News, San Gabriel Valley
Reporter interviewing MPD at Crime Scene.
My morning started off pretty normal. Kids off to school, update some reading, get a couple of blog posts done and then do some press releases for a coming show.
Then my phone rang. Fellow Monrovian Robert Parry called and let me know that MPD had Melrose and Hillcrest closed. He “heard” there was a dead body found. He tried to take a pic and he was asked to leave. He called me to see if I knew what was going on or if I could find out.
I knew the neighborhood. Its all older homes with a lot of our seniors living there. Not the place one would expect much more than petty crimes if anything. When I arrived a lot of people were standing on their porches and lawns looking at the yellow crime scene tape and all the squad cars.
It took a little conversation with a few of them and I learned what happened. I choked. I was told it was a suicide. An elderly gentleman who was in tough times trying to recover from 2 strokes felt useless. He shot himself outside so as not to ruin the inside of his home. Sometime around 8AM he did the deed breaking the silence and ended his unhappiness. I suddenly felt very horrible. This is something so private and tragic I just had to stop in my tracks and think a bit. I can’t intrude. I do need to do something to ensure their privacy a bit.
In talking with one of the gentleman he pointed out another man sitting on the corner and told he would have all the details. I was told he and the deceased were close friends. I did talk with him a bit and give him my condolences. I wanted to cry with him. How sad is it that one of our community felt so useless that he had to end it this way.
He and the deceased were friends since they were 8 years old. His wife and he grew up with him, shared a lifetime of memories together. We chatted a bit and my words of sympathy and encouragement to help the survivors felt somehow shallow. But what does one say in a situation like that? For my part I’m not giving names all I can do is allow that family their time in peace to come to grips with what happened.
I feel horrible for this man. Depression after strokes is not uncommon. Depression in our elderly is not uncommon either. Certainly resources like Medicare and Medical aren’t enough to help our elderly of modest resources when faced with the challenges.
I have to give props to our police officers and what they run into on every call. I wonder how the “crime scene” reporters have come to grips with walking into this info as well.
RIP neighbor. I wish your family the best in the coming weeks.
Pic by me. I stopped with just that when I learned what was going on.
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