I thought I would share a funny story with you about my first real experience with pepper spray. For those who don’t know about pepper spay, we use it for what’s called pain compliance. In other words, if you don’t do what I tell you to do, your face is going to feel a shit load of pain. Unlike mace, which burns your skin, pepper spray effects the mucus membranes; eyes, mouth, nose. Pepper spray is made from the extract of hot peppers so it’s non-toxic and relatively safe.

It causes immediate closing of the eyes, difficulty breathing, runny nose, and coughing. The duration of its effects depend on the strength of the spray but the average full effect lasts around thirty to forty-five minutes, with diminished effects lasting for hours. With that said, it is one of the most painful things I have ever experienced. I remember when I got my first can of spray. I decided to “try it out” so I sprayed a bit in my hands and rubbed in on my cheeks. I was underwhelmed. I only felt a little bit of burning similar to what you feel when you get hot pepper sauce on you lips. It was no big deal so my fear of pepper spray was gone. Ha!

Fast forward a few months later when another investigator and I were attempting to arrest a three striker meth addict at a trailer park called Sleepy Hallow. Anyone who knows San Jose, knows this trailer park. It’s on Monterey Road in South San Jose and has been there as far back as I can remember. It’s so bad even the trailer trash are afraid to park their double wides here.

As we approached our defendant we noticed he was carrying a 2 or 3 month old yellow Labrador Retriever. We yelled at him to “drop the puppy” (just kidding) and attempted to arrest him.  He immediately pulled away from my partner who, for whatever reason, decided to spray this guy in the face. Well, unfortunately for me, I was standing to the right of my partner about 2 feet from the defendant. When the spray hit him it bounced off and hit me square in the eyes and mouth.

I was not expecting what happened next. My eyes immediately swelled shut and I felt the most intense pain I have ever experienced. As my eyes we closing shut I saw the defendant take of running with my partner following. I knew I couldn’t leave him alone, I have to deal with the pain and try to keep up with them. As I took of running I ran right through another cloud of pepper spray. This time I got a mouth and nose full and the pain was worsening. I yelled to my partner that I could not see so he was smart enough to yell “over here, over here”.

When we finally caught up with the defendant my eyes were now completely closed and an enormous amount of snot was coming from my nose. So much so that it looked like my head was leaking fluid. It was a stream of snot. Everything hurt, my eyes, my mouth and my nose. I was having trouble breathing and I was starting to panic. To make matters worse this guy wasn’t going to give up without a fight. We were on the ground trying to get hand cuffs on him when my partner started yelling “he’s trying to get my gun, he’s trying to get my gun”.

During the 3 or 4 minute fight, I could no longer catch my breath and I was getting scared. I couldn’t see anything and the pain was becoming almost too much to handle. I had to keep prying my eyes open with my fingers so I could see what was going on. So I could see just enough to get this guy in cuffs. When we finally got him under control I had to stand under a garden hose for 10 minutes to try and ease the pain. Every time I turned it off the pain came back.

Finally, after about an hour or so I started to feel normal again. It wasn’t until that evening when I took a shower did the pain return. It seems that pepper spray is reactivated when exposed to warm water. When I was assigned a taser I tossed my pepper spray in the trash, never to be used again (except on dogs). I would rather be tased then relive the pain I experienced that day.