To Love a Cop by Janice Kay Johnson Read Free Book Online Page A

Oregon has a hate crimes law? It makes the penalty harsher for any given crime than it would be for one that wasn’t motivated by dislike of someone’s race, color, religion or sexual orientation.”
    She frowned. “There was something on KGW news about a fire and a swastika spray painted on the driveway.”
    He winced. “That one’s mine. I’m...getting a lot of pressure on it. Do you know how many Portland residents have last names that sound Jewish or that some idiot could interpret as Jewish when really they’re Polish or Russian or who knows what? City hall is getting a barrage of panicky phone calls, which means the police department brass are, which means...”
    Understanding dawned. “You are.” No wonder he’d had that expression on his face a minute ago.
    “What’s a swastika?” Jake asked, predictably. Normally he’d have watched the news with her, but he’d been sulking in his room.
    Ethan explained, his tone grim. “The home you saw on the news is the fourth instance of vandalism within two weeks that included the spray painted swastika. First place it was painted was on the garage door, second house, on the front window, third, on the lawn. Those earlier ones were mostly garden-variety vandalism. Eggs, rocks thrown through windows, that kind of thing.”
    Mostly. She wondered about that, but didn’t want to ask with Jake here. She thought Ethan would have said otherwise.
    “Vandalism doesn’t sound significant enough to justify all the anxiety, but the fire is a significant escalation,” he continued. “We’re afraid someone is going to be hurt soon. There’s always the possibility a home owner with a gun will use it, too.”
    “But that’s good, isn’t it?” Jake said. “I mean, that’s why people want guns. So they can protect themselves.”
    Good? Laura thought in shock. He knew how vehemently she opposed the whole idea, and still—
    “It is,” Ethan agreed, raising her ire, but went on before she could jump in. “The problem is, your average person hasn’t practiced enough to be able to use their weapon effectively. They get scared and are more likely to freeze up than they are to shoot the right person at the right time. A dad panics, shoots and kills his teenage son who was sneaking into the house late at night. Or it’s a burglar, Dad points the gun, but the burglar wrestles it away from him. And here’s the bigger question...”
    Laura was as mesmerized as Jake. Ethan wasn’t saying what she’d expected from him. And, thank God, he’d been tactful enough not to include in his little litany, Kids get their hands on their parents’ guns and tragic accidents happen.
    “We have the death penalty in this state.” He leaned forward, elbows braced on his thighs, and looked and sounded even grimmer. “Someone has to have been convicted of aggravated murder to receive death as a sentence. So, if we as a society agreed that’s the only crime that we can justify putting someone to death for committing, is it all right for a home owner to shoot and kill someone breaking into his house?”
    “But...it’s self-defense, isn’t it?”
    Laura was glad to hear that Jake sounded unsure.
    “It’s usually ruled to be. And sometimes it is. A woman is certainly entitled to protect herself from a man who intends to rape her, for example. But the average burglar doesn’t intend to hurt anyone. He’s sneaking in, hoping to grab some hot electronics, maybe some jewelry, and sneak back out without anyone hearing him. If the home owner were to yell that he’d called 911, the guy would bolt. These idiots who target people with a Jewish last name were committing only vandalism until this last time, when they set a fire, too. Their form of vandalism was ugly and indefensible, don’t get me wrong. But a capital crime? Not in my view.”
    “So...if you were, like, staking out a house and they showed up and started, you know, painting the swastika and throwing rocks and maybe setting a