PROTECT AND SERVE: LAW ENFORCEMENT OFFICERS DESERVE THANKS

Texas Department of Public Safety Trooper Ryan Koonce made four
arrests last weekend. As a result, 9 pounds and 500 tablets of illegal
drugs were confiscated.

All the arrests were made between the hours of 1 and 3 a.m., when most
of us are safely at home. Koonce, and other law enforcement officers
like him, are out patrolling solitary streets and dark highways.

Many of us have experienced the anxiety associated with catching a
glimpse of flashing lights in a rearview mirror. The price of a ticket
or several hours attending a driver's safety course is about the worst
most have to fear from being stopped for a traffic offense.

It is difficult to imagine the amount of mental preparedness and
resolve required to pull over a vehicle on a sparsely traveled highway
at 3 a.m., especially when considering that any vehicle has the
potential of being driven by a wanted criminal, someone transporting
illegal drugs, and/or someone carrying a weapon. Rarely do officers
stop vehicles knowing in advance that the person behind the wheel is
armed and dangerous.

We realize that every law officer who accepts the job also accepts
that he or she may be killed or wounded. Officers accept it and live
with it, as do their families.

This is true even in small towns such as Huntington, where officer
John Logan was fatally shot during a routine traffic stop on a sunny
Saturday morning. His wife never expected that he would be in danger
there -- Officer Logan did. He wrote a letter to his wife before he
died, just in case.

Were it not for those brave enough to face their own mortality with
every traffic stop they make, Officer Koonce would not have discovered
6 pounds of cocaine, 3 pounds of marijuana or 500 Vicodin tablets.

Maybe it isn't the biggest drug bust of the century, but it might have
been to a parent whose teen was prevented from an overdose because the
supply never reached the buyers.

It is easy for those of us who work in an "8 to 5" world to take for
granted what others must do to "protect and serve." It is often a
thankless task, performed for less than princely sums, at great
personal risk.

We appreciate the job that Trooper Koonce and all those in law
enforcement do for us, 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

Keep up the good work.