When I was a rookie, back in the late 60's, female cops were not something most departments wanted to take a chance on. Too many risks in the wholly chauvinistic world of New Jersey law enforcement. The closest most departments like ours had was matrons; part-time, on call women who would come in when asked to strip search a female prisoner or provide transportation to the county jail with women who were locked up. Principally, the idea was to verify that male officers did not molest the female prisoners. But, the concept of sworn female officers on regular patrol was out of the question. Believe it or not, one of the arguments against female cops was the notion that they would be hanging panty hose in the locker room to the discomfort of the men.
All that changed in the mid to late seventies when a municipality two towns over from where I worked hired Jane Kelly as a regular street cop. Were they insane!? How could she do the work of a man? River Bridge P.D. was looking for trouble. I never gave it much thought. Even though River Bridge was just a short distance from my beat, I rarely had occasion to interact with them. Months went by and the novelty appeared to wear off as Jane performed her duties well and she gained acceptance among the forty men who served with her. Cops love to gossip and Jane ceased being a subject of their curiosity.
At the time, I was the senior of a group of three detectives. Part of my job was preparing case files for the grand jury. Every Thursday, I would take a ride down to the County Seat in the morning to testify and then head to the Prosecutor's Office to deliver new files. The Grand Jury consists of 21 citizens who hear testimony about a case to determine if a crime occurred and if it did, that the person charged could reasonably be suspected of having committed it. If a majority agrees, they issue a bill of indictment and the defendant is held over for trial. Testimony is straight forward. Only the prosecution is heard, so there is no participation by the defense; that all comes later.
I had already testified before the Grand Jury numerous times, so on this particular day, I was anticipating no problems. For me, it was quite routine. Or so I thought.
I arrived at nine o'clock on the dot and took a seat on an ancient oak bench in the waiting room that made a creaking sound every time you moved. I was to testify about a burglary and an armed robbery. The two crimes were not related in any way and a total of three defendants had been arrested. My actual testimony would take perhaps twenty minutes. But, I had learned early on, that the call to testify could be early or late and that it was wise to bring a puzzle or something to read to kill the waiting time. This time, I was working on a crossword puzzle.
A few minutes after I sat down, I noticed a woman appearing in the waiting area. She stopped to speak to the attendant, who appeared to check off her name on the list he had on his clipboard as he motioned for her to sit down on the old bench. She sat right next to me, appearing quite nervous. She was pleasant looking,mid to late 20's, around 5'7" tall, with strawberry blonde hair and beautiful green eyes. She wore a dark blue pants suit with a white button-down blouse. She wore a gold stick pin-which were quite popular at the time-in the lapel of her suit jacket.
I nodded to her in recognition of her arrival and she smiled tentatively. She opened a briefcase and took out a file and began to review it. I figured she was a witness to a crime and had never been called upon to testify in any kind of official proceeding before. I went back to my puzzle.
"Is this your first time?," she asked as I was trying to think of a seven letter word for an African cat.
"At what?," I replied as I looked up with a smile on my face.
"Testifying before the grand jury," she said seriously.
"No, I'm down here nearly every Thursday," I explained. "Why, is it your first time? I can see you're a little nervous."
"It is my first time and I am a little nervous."
"Don't be, it's simple. Are you a witness to a crime?"
"Sort of. It's a fatal motor vehicle accident and I charged the drunk driver with vehicular homicide."
All of a sudden it clicked. This was Jane Kelly. I quickly introduced myself. Then, I gave her the scoop on what was going to happen when she went in to testify. She seemed relieved to have had the info and appeared more relaxed about what lay ahead of her. I was called in to testify first. I winked at her as I stood to go into the hearing room. She smiled. Fifteen minutes later, I was finished and I sat down next to Jane to give her the final pep talk. Then, they called her in to testify.
"Wait for me. I have something I want to talk to you about."
Ten minutes later Jane came back to the bench. "You were right. It was a piece of cake. Thanks for all the help."