When on duty, police officers can experience some pretty unique things. Two days are never the same in the line of duty, and there's really no telling what they'll encounter. One of their main responsibilities is making sure people stay out of trouble, and giving out punishments when needed. There's a good chance they've heard it all - people can come up with some creative excuses to avoid harsh discipline. But, what if the person isn't making up and excuse, and happens to be telling the truth?
Police officers on Reddit share the time when a person they suspected to be lying was actually telling the truth. Content has been edited for clarity.
“Too Embarrassed To Admit It”
“I was doing a tour as a military police officer, and we got called on a domestic violence call. At the house, there is this huge corn-fed guy about 6’4 and 275 pounds, and a petite Asian girl about 4’10 and 95 pounds soaking wet. The whole house was in disarray, and the call had come because of yelling heard by the neighbors. She was crying and talking in an Asian language none of us understood, and kept gesturing toward her huge husband.
He wasn’t talking. We cuff him up, take him to the station, and are trying to interview him, but he’s not saying much. We intend to charge him with domestic assault. We notice somewhere along the way he has horrible welts all along the backs of his hands and along his forearms. It took a lot of prying, but we finally got out of him that his wife would beat him with wire coat hangers when she was mad, and apparently that was pretty often.
He was too embarrassed to admit it to anybody that he was being abused by his wife who was less than a third of his size. We finally got it straightened out, turned her over to the local police, and barred her from base. Hopefully the guy got the help he needed.”
“Laughing So Hard He Can Barely Breathe”
“My first week in the job we pull up and see a couple of kids smoking in their car with the windows down. The city has an ordinance against smoking on park property, but it is too petty to give them a ticket.
We approach the car and they are visibly nervous. My field training officer looks through the windows and sees a couple of drinks in the car. Bingo.
We get them out and start running their info, they are all underage but old enough to smoke. My field training officer asks them where the drinks came from- the driver says he recycles. He laughs and begins to search the car.
I’m finishing up running their info, and these guys are being really respectful. My field training officer finishes searching the cab and goes to open the trunk. All the sudden I hear him bust out laughing. He is laughing so hard he can barely breathe.
He waves me over to look at the trunk of the car and it is level with crushed cans and bottles.
My field training officer said that he has heard that excuse for 20 years and this is the first time it was true. He walked up, uncuffed the driver, and let him go.”
“I Drove Back In Shock And Amazement”
“One night I’m out working, and as I go down the street (fairly nice middle class area surrounded by some high crime neighborhoods) around midnight I see a dude on a bike, no lights on, pulling a lawn mower behind him on a rope.
I immediately flip a 180 and light him up. Recognize the guy as a local homeless dude with some prior burglary/theft arrests. I walk up and just open with ‘Dude, come on.’
Guy holds his hands out and swears he didn’t steal the lawnmower. Claims someone just gave it to him. I ask who, and he doesn’t know a name. So I demand he tell me where to find said lawnmower owner.
The directions he gave were literally ‘Go that way a bit, then right at a stop sign, and take one of those side streets that way. It’s about halfway down a street, at a house that has a pickup and a car in the driveway.’
By this point backup had arrived, so I leave him in the presence of backup, and drive off in search of his mythical donor of lawn equipment. I made a decent guess as to the first turn, then flipped a mental coin as to which of the next three side streets he would have gone down. I pick the second of the three streets, and start down it. Every other house has a truck and car combo…there must have been a dozen houses that matched the description.
Halfway down, I see an average looking house and think to myself, Ehh, I’ll try this one. After all, it’s midnight and this is a wild goose chase. Go up, ring the doorbell…middle-aged dude comes to the door.
‘Hello sir, have you been giving away lawnmowers to random sketchy homeless guys at midnight today?’ I ask him.
Yes. As a matter of fact, he had. Homeowner goes on to complain to me that his wife was upset as his continual inability to get the mower running, and had ordered him with some severity to remove the mower from the house or face the consequences. He pushed it to the curb right as homeless guy rode by, and the latter had asked and received his permission to take it.
I drove back in shock and amazement. Apologized to homeless guy, and sent him on his way. A few months later we ran into each other at a nearby gas station, and he told me it turned out just to need a new spark plug, and that he had gotten it running again, before going on to sell it for $150 to someone.
For years after, whenever I would run into him, he would always make sure to remind me of the money he made from selling that ‘stolen’ lawnmower.”
Officer, It’s Not What It Looks Like
“I was driving with my fiancé, and we went through a roadblock where they checked registration. We got to the cops, and they asked for our registration. I was sitting in the passenger seat, so I opened up the glovebox and right there was a clear, unmarked baggie filled to the brim with catnip. I completely forgot it was there and just froze. Wide-eyed, I turned to look at the cop shining his light through my open window, and he was frozen too, just staring at the baggie with this look on his face like Really?
I just started immediately professing, ‘Oh my god, I swear to god this is catnip, you can take it and smell it or test it or whatever like I swear.’
And at this point it was just so ridiculous that I started cracking up, and the cop took it and reasonably deduced I was telling the truth, and he started laughing and called his partner over and told her what happened, and they both just cackled away for a minute and sent us on our way.”
“We Aren’t Stupid, Or So We Thought”
“I’m a deputy with the local sheriff’s department. Me and a few sector partners were hanging out at a gas station at about 3 am to get some coffee and a snack. We were outside chit chatting, waiting for the next call to come in. One guy pulls up in a pewter colored Oldsmobile with a hubcap missing, hops out of the car and starts pumping gas.
One of us noticed he had a weapon holster on his right side but couldn’t see a weapon because his shirt was over it. Since the weapon was concealed by the shirt, we just stopped to talk with him. Explain to him that he can’t conceal the weapon, he said it was no problem.
Other partner looks in the passenger side of the car and there’s a fist sized Saran Wrap bag of white powder with multiple bills underneath it sitting on the passenger seat right in plain view. Now to us, we have seen a weapon, large size bag of white powder, good bit of money underneath, appears to be narcotic related.
We start questioning the guy, asking him, ‘Hey, what is this all of this, and why is it just on your seat?’
He says, ‘Oh it’s powdered wall plaster, I just got it from my grandma.’
It’s 3 am, at a gas station. I mean come on, we’re cops so by all means we aren’t the smartest people on the planet, but we ain’t stupid. Or so we thought.
Turns out the dude is 100% telling the truth. The weapon was legal and legally obtained, his only history we could dig up was speeding tickets and a simple disturbing the peace charge from years ago. Grandma gave him the plaster so he could fix a hole in his wall, and he didn’t have cash to buy it himself, so she spotted him some moolah.
Needless to say, he’s got a funny story to tell and I guess now I do too. He was super understanding and even himself said it was hilarious because it absolutely looked like pure crack and it looked like a huge amount (at least for lowly street deputies).”
“One Chance To Prove He’s Telling The Truth”
“I popped a college kid for terrible driving, and pulled several grams of weed off of him. Also, a one pound glass pipe shaped like a huge nail. No big deal. Also find weed under the other college kids in the car. Driver falls on the sword, and tells me all of it is his and lets his friends walk free. I like this kid.
However, during the search we find packaged uppers in the cellophane of a tube pack with the top melted closed. Ask kid if he’s dealing uppers at school. Tell him I’m aware of the prescription pill epidemic. He says no and spins a huge yarn about how he only carries a few on him because he’s had his orange pill bottle stolen so many times. Kid seems like a pretty good dude. I decided to take the X-files approach. Supervisor tells me pursue charges for dealing. I tell the kid he has one chance to prove he’s telling the truth.
Shows me the broken glass under his drivers seat from a vehicle burglary. Gotta do better. I follow behind him back to his dorm, he lets me in and shows me the busted footlocker he kept them in under his bed. Don’t know if this is strong enough. Supervisors telling me to hurry and drop the axe. Tell him to do better. He calls one of the soccer team assistants up, and we meet him in the locker room. Shows me the little wooden locker which has a broken lock. Ehhh.
Assistant coach tells me they have replaced the lock on his cabinet three times. Campus security has numerous reports of medicine theft from this kid. Nice. I call supervisor up and tell him I have no grounds to pursue delivery charges.
Poor guy just kept getting his adderall jacked and being the big dumb meatball he was, he started packaging them like that. I end up talking to his best friend breaking up a house party a couple months later. Friend tells me kid is a stand up guy who only uses weed due to extreme anxiety (totally believable from my interaction with him) and has never sold anything in his life. Friend thanked me and told me his buddy spoke well of me. Friend also tells me he had to drive his buddy to the hospital a few hours after I left from a panic attack due to the whole incident.
I felt bad for the kid. So now, whenever I see him smoking up in his car in the mall parking lot I just wave.”
That’s Certainly One Way To Get Out Of Speeding Ticket
“This happened in Canada. This is important for building the scene of a long barren highway, snow on the trees, and a grey straight stretch of road that only gets that grey when it’s so cold the road salt is frozen.
I have colitis. The ulcerative kind. The kind that is incredibly painful when held in. I was holding it in when my adventure began.
I was racing home, well over the speed limit at about 100 mph trying not to ruin my car’s upholstery. My left leg was pressing so hard on the floor of the car it was trembling. I saw a terrifying sight ahead. A lonely prowling police SUV was cruising in front of me.
I normally would have slowed down, and remained well behind the officer. But this time, I had an unholy demon clawing at my insides. It’s fingernails ripping painfully through my engorged intestines. I kept up my speed, as I was a panicked man close to madness.
As expected the police lights came on, and the siren wailed. This pulled me out of my trance, and into a shocked reality. I’ve never gotten a speeding ticket before and I froze. The adrenaline shattered the field of pain, and I was able to pull over and address the situation.
After sheepishly handing over my papers, the officer asked me ‘Why were you driving so fast?’
And I replied ‘Officer, I’m so sorry I really have to go to the bathroom. I have colitis.’
The officer didn’t look impressed, and made an offer. ‘Is that so? If you can go right now in the ditch, I’ll let you go.’
I literally lept at the offer. I scrambled out of the car, and exposed my butt to the freezing cold air, and nothing. I gave a little push. Nothing. I didn’t understand, but apparently adrenaline and freezing cold can hinder things. Then it happened immediately following a cough caused by the cold air. My butt was unleashing steaming foul spray of blood and feces that would make a zombie flee. It was a horizontal fountain of stench and terror.
I wiped myself with some snow and cleaned up my inner thighs. I looked up to see a genuinely concerned man with a pale look of shock. The officer had removed his hat and while clutching it to his chest, handed me my papers, and let me go.”
“My Friend Gave It To Me”
“So it’s the holiday season a few years ago. I work at a coffee shop at the time and go to a co-worker’s New Years ugly sweater party. Have a few drinks until 10pm then switch to water. My one friend gets to talking to me about tea cause we work with coffee and tea – gives me a teabag in a plastic baggy. I put it in my pocket.
Two am rolls around and I leave but I am tired as heck. I want to get home and get to sleep, so I’m blasting music to keep me awake and probably going a little too fast but not drastically so.
Anyway the party lights kick on behind me and I pull over. We go through the questions. Where you coming from? Where you going? You been drinking? Doing anything else?
I blow clean on the breathalyzer. I walk the line fine. Balance on one leg. Then one of the cops pats me down and reaches my pocket.
Him: ‘Son. What do you have in your pocket?’
Me, knowing how ridiculous I’m about to sound,: ‘It’s tea, officer.’
Him, about as dubious as you can expect: ‘You expect me to believe you have tea in your pocket.’
Me: ‘My friend gave it to me.’
At this point his partner looks to be trying not to laugh at the absurdity of this situation. The cop in front of me looks over his shoulder at his partner in a You believe this guy? sort of way then back to me.
Him: ‘Get it out’
He holds out his hand while I fumble around and withdraw the plastic baggy from my pants pocket, complete with the single serving of tea neatly labeled, and hand it to the suddenly bewildered officer.
Him: ‘Why the heck do you have tea in your pocket??’ he asks
Me: ‘I like tea, officer.”
I respond in probably the most matter of fact way possible. How partner finally gives up on restraining his laughter. The other cop gives me the tea back and tells me to go home and sleep. I never could bring myself to try that tea – I still have it in the same bag on my shelf.”
“I Can Smell It From Here”
“My fourth grade teacher went to a cousin’s wedding in mid-July. The cousin had overestimated how many drinks they would need at the reception, and was giving away bottles to anyone who was interested, so my teacher took three and put them in the backseat of her car.
Again, this was a hot summer day in July.
After saying their goodbyes, my teacher, her husband, and her parents piled into the car and pulled out onto the highway – where two bottles burst open, spraying the drinks everywhere and causing quite a ruckus.
Of course while this was happening, the car was swerving as the driver was also getting bathed in the drink. So it came as no surprise that as soon as they collected themselves, they saw the familiar flashing lights of a state trooper and pulled over.
According to my teacher, the first thing the cop said was ‘I’m not gonna ask if you’ve been drinking because I can smell it from here.’
My teacher tried explaining what had happened, but the cop wouldn’t hear of it and ordered everyone out of the car. That’s when the cop saw that everyone, both drivers and passengers, were dressed in their finery, but soaked, and looking quite shaken. A cursory search showed the open bottles, but the cop still insisted on a quick sobriety check just to make sure.”
“I Think I’m About To Hit The Jackpot”
“I worked as a mall cop during the summer, and usually the mall is usually pretty dead. When I worked at this place it was in a city that had a top 10 crime rate, so enough to keep us on our toes, but by this point I hadn’t had to respond to anything in about six months. No fights, no shoplifters, just walking in a circle seeing who could get the most steps in on their pedometer for the day. I was due to be exterior patrol and ride around in the mall-cop favorite Ford Escape. I’m supposed to drive five miles every hour in ‘patrol’ so I usually just drove in circles. As soon as I was in there till I hit 10 miles then put it in park and play on my phone.
As soon as I finish the 10 miles, I put it in park and decide to throw in a dip and watch some Futurama on my phone using the theater’s wifi. About two minutes in, I get a call saying there’s a fight going on. I’m mad my relaxation and Futurama has been ruined. I run inside and people are pointing to the guys who had been fighting.
I take one guy and point at the other group and let my partner know who the other combatant was. I begin talking to this guy finding out what the heck is going on. I’m in a bad mood, so decide for once I’m going to be rude instead of the guy who soothes things out.
Me: ‘What the heck is so important we have to be fighting right now? Don’t you have better things to be doing than fighting in a mall?’
Other guy: ‘Man I wasn’t fighting, I don’t know who told you that!’
Me: ‘Your hands are literally shaking right now. That happens when you have a bunch of adrenaline running through your system, idiot. Don’t give me these lies or I’ll call the cops and have you arrested.’
Other guy: ‘Man, my hands are shaking because I got that Parkinson’s disease.’
Me: ‘That has got to be the stupidest excuse I have ever heard. What a crock of lies. You must think I’m an idiot. You’re coming with me.’
So I take him back to one of our rooms. Now, I have no authority to actually search someone but I asked if I could pat him down for my protection and he agreed. I’m just looking for a reason to get this guy in jail and as I’m patting him down I feel a bottle in his pants and ask him to take it out.
He complies and I think I’m about to hit the jackpot… until I read the bottle: ‘Take 3 pills twice daily for tremors.’
Oh. No.
Me: ‘Listen, I don’t ever say this, but I’m sorry. I was a little harsh in my language with you and for that I apologize, but I need to know what happened.’
Well, the other guy confessed he was fighting the other other guy, all over some something he said about the guy’s girlfriend. I didn’t call the cops, and told him not to come back for a few weeks and apologized again. He was pretty chill, accepted my apology and even shook my hand and thanked me. He thought it was some racism trip that I was on and was worried he was going to go to jail.
I was a little more receptive after that.”
“The Worst Excuse I’ve Ever Heard”
“I was on routine patrol near a bunch of fast food places. A car comes barreling out of one of the fast food drive throughs and ALMOST hits me. My response was very measured, ‘WHOA. Dang, that was close!’
The car then starts swerving all over the road but doing the speed limit. It’s noon. I pulled the guy over, start talking to him, run him out. Guy has never had so much as a parking ticket. But he’s slurring his words so bad I can’t understand him. He’s HAMMERED – or so I thought. Now I’ve seen plenty of driving under the influence situations- like medical conditions: crashes, diabetics, chemotherapy- things that at first looks like a driving under the influence situation.
But he said no to all those questions. Then I ask about prescription meds. He said he’s just got back from Africa and takes anti malaria medication.
Sure. Sure.
My partner and I looked at each other and just started laughing.
‘Sir that’s the worst excuse I’ve ever heard,’ I said between laughs.
But he goes on, explains, explains some more, and lets me see the bottle. We call on pharmacologist, and this guy is ACTUALLY on some Umbrella Corp level meds.
He was telling the truth the whole time.
We explained to him technically he could still get a driving under the influence charge, and he can’t drive on these meds.
I apologized for not believing him at first and explained EVERY SINGLE hammered driver offers these kind of excuses and this is the whole reason we ask a ton of questions to confirm what your saying is true.
Yes, I was frustrated at him in the beginning. He never knew it though. He had no memory of nearly hitting me and I was very nice to him the whole time.”
“He Obviously Wanted To Deflect The Conversation”
“My department frequently had to deal with this male extoic dancer who kept getting released in work release programs. No joke, we caught this guy doing dirty acts in broad daylight at stoplights. Anyways I and a few coworkers leave town for a conference, and guess who we find up to his old tricks? He’s outside of our jurisdiction so we don’t do anything about it besides report him, but we talked to him and he gave some excuse about how he was flown in on a private jet for some record deal. Yes he had mentioned his hip hop career to us earlier, but we had never heard his music so we didn’t believe him.
Anyways, we sort of forget about him until we get to the Greyhound station. There he is again up to his normal ‘tricks.’ He obviously wanted to deflect the conversation from what he was doing, so he offered to give us a ride back to our city in his private jet. We detain him but before we can even call the local station, a limo rolls up and the chauffeur walks around with a sign with his name on it.
Dude was telling the truth about his record deal.
We apologized for not believing him, and upgraded our travel arrangements to use his private jet. He still gives us regular trouble of course.”
