Not all crimes are heinous and not all police persons solve their problems with gun-violence. When starting this story, AV Singer was tired of it. Not every situation warrants the immediate firing of a gun nor is it necessary to immediately threaten the use of one. Does anyone else get tired of the endless shoot-em-ups in our media? What if criminals weren't really bad guys? This would eliminate the need to use guns as a solution. What if our heroes were always one step behind? They'd need good intuition because these criminals know what they are doing. What activities could be seen as criminal, but in the end, no harm has occurred? They'd have to have alternative motives. The result was Robins and A Merry Band of Hoods. Senior Inspector Jackson Tyler and his junior partner, Inspector Tomio Dubanowski are stuck on their second swing shift in a week and a half. What could be more stressful than sitting upright at this hour? That's what Tom wants to know. Jackson has been working long enough to take whatever Detroit's police department dishes out; he doesn't care why they've been assigned. Whether to relieve stress or because they botched the last investigation, he simply wants to get on with it, with as little hassle as possible.Someone robs the storeroom of a BP Convenience store. Why? Why would any criminal bother, unless there is something bigger and more sinister than what is apparent? Jack and Tom spend the next twenty-four hours investigating a string of the most absurd crimes they have ever seen: a storeroom robbery, a dairy heist, missing boats, and a weird, musical-chair swap of automobiles. In this 'who-done-it' tale, they chase modern-day Robin Hoods, wondering why any self-respecting criminal would go to such ridiculous lengths to make them miserable. Could swing shift get anymore tortuous?That first draft was whimsy, but three years later, as the final draft was written, gun violence was so pervasive it almost seemed to be the norm. It's reflected in our television programming - unwarranted, brutality-charged arrests, guns as threats or dirty solutions. This is not normal. AV felt a strong need to get away from that paradigm, but there was also a need to address the issue.Most police professionals are conscientious, hardworking people, daily doing an honest job with integrity and compassion. It's only a few that react like fearful animals; a reaction that AV feels is borne from a need for more extensive training. Unfortunately, that untrained reaction is what we see in our programming and on the news. What can we do to change this? Police men and women risk their relationships and sometimes their lives to protect our streets. Wouldn't it be prudent for our culture to spend more money to train them? This revision touches on some of that pathos. Jack's and Tom's lives are touched by a public that is outraged by violence, violence that seems to increase exponentially the more we champion it. The main theme in Robins and a Merry Band of Hoods is farcical, but these characters are facing some of the reality that our real-life police forces face: uncertainty, misunderstandings, and the consequence of being cursorily trained for the untenable situation of having to face anger and contempt on a daily basis. There is just a touch of it to keep this story real, but as promised, the crimes are preposterous and non-violent, and the police do not have to use their guns to bring the story to a satisfying conclusion.
About the Author: AV Singer has written for newspapers and trade magazines, is a published poet and short story author and is now self-publishing. This is the second in a series of stories about Inspectors Jackson Tyler and Tomio Dubanowski. Be sure to follow this author on Facebook, Amazon and Good Reads. You can sign-up for AV's newsletter by linking to: https: //docs.google.com/forms/d/1gVVfQpXer7CJAFjG3Mij0QUnTWC6kTrjSeY-2VhMMvs/edi