Summer’s constant companion, humidity, was inescapable. It was Sunday evening. Billy Bowers and I were talking to a victim of a theft at the end of Colworth Place. We were by the patrol car when the call came out. “Signal 53, John’s Gin Road at Keatchie Marshall Road. Occupants of a four door Chevrolet are trapped inside.”
John’s Gin Road is the last north/south road before the Texas state line. Keatchie Marshall Road is the last east/west road before you get to Desoto Parish. It is rural on a busy day. We were 12 miles away as the crow flies but along country roads it was closer to twenty. Billy and I were the closest unit. I flipped on the lights and siren and drove like I could get there in five minutes. That’s when the rain hit.
The thunderstorm did not prevent the sun from shining. We were driving into the early stages of sunset, and the reflection on wet pavement blinded us at times. I snuck up on half a dozen Sunday drivers and flipped my siren from Yelp to Hi-Lo, but when we got to John’s Gin Road, the traffic thinned out. I was making good time in the straight away when I forgot about the 45 degree curve ahead. It was too late to apply my brakes in the pouring rain, so I took the curve at 60 mph which is foolish on a good day. I expected to end up in the ditch, but somehow, the tires held on to the wet pavement. I whispered, “Thank you Lord,” and Billy gave a hearty amen.
Fire District 4 was on scene when we arrived and had the intersection shut down. A four door sedan was on the far side of John’s Gin on the shoulder. The driver’s side was caved in from an impact which was heard from miles away. A large van was a hundred yards west on the side of Keatchie Marshall Road with heavy front end damage, enough to push the motor into the driver’s compartment. Two hundred more feet and it would have made it to Texas. Billy and I went to the van and spoke to the driver who was upright, and by divine providence, unscathed. He had a van load of migrant workers who disappeared before our arrival. He told us the car shot out in front of him, having run the stop sign at the intersection. The van T-boned the car at 55 mph and spun out of control to its final resting place.
We rushed over to the car which by now was draped with a tarp. I lifted the tarp and opened the passenger door to find two men lying silently in seats broken loose from their mounts and leaning backward. It was a scene from a horror movie. The air was heavy with iron from blood and alcohol. I reached over the corpse of a man to open the glove compartment. Behind two bottles of Jack Daniels Lynchburg Lemonade, I found the registration and insurance.
The paramedics were fifty feet beyond us, desperately working on a thirteen year old girl who had been thrown from the car during the crash. We set up an LZ in the middle of the road, and Billy, who was a helicopter paramedic when he wasn’t riding with me or working full time as a Shreveport Fireman, directed the landing of the helicopter in the middle of the road. Other deputies arrived to control traffic as the rain stopped and the sun dropped in the west leaving a masterpiece of a sunset. The raincoat that kept me dry earlier became a sauna. I was dripping wet before finally removing it and hanging it on my mirror to dry.
The little girl was stable when the helicopter left to take her to the hospital. I took measurements, found the point of impact which was a deep, long gouge in the pavement, and collected the paperwork I needed. The Coroner arrived, and the firemen cut the car open to extricate two men who weren’t going home that night. We made room for two body bags in the Coroner’s van. Two wreckers arrived but were delayed with the clean up of glass, metal, plastic, bottles, and car parts. The firemen sprayed the intersection down with their hoses, washing away oil, transmission and brake fluid. When the wreckers were loaded, the only evidence of a crash was the gouge in the pavement.
There was no field sobriety or Breathalyzer tests to do. Justice came in a different jurisdiction leaving those who remained to some how learn to live with tragedy that would never go away.
Billy and I left the crash scene for the hospital to check on the little girl and get her information. We were on I-20 in Shreveport when Dispatch called and told us the little girl didn’t make it. I looked up to see a billboard with a picture of a cold bottle of Lynchburg Lemonade on it, and I thought about the irony of the picture and the scene I just left. The bottles in the glove compartment of the car filled with death were not as appealing as the picture on that billboard.
The law enforcement officers who do our dirty work and clean up our messes live with constant reminders of how frail life truly is. For guys like me, those reminders are accompanied with the realization that God does not leave his creatures without hope. You see, Christ gave himself on the cross to provide for all who repent and trust in him alone. “For God made Jesus who knew no sin to be sin for us that we might become the righteous of God through him.” 2 Corinthians 5:21
Rest In Peace Billy Bowers, 2024
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