This is whatI just sent to Memphis City Council.... Dear Memphis City Council, You dont know me, youve most likely never heard of me or spoken of me so let me fill you in about myself and what Ive been dealing with over the past 7 years. My name is Lisa Cain. I am a mother of 3 children and the wife of Retired Officer Billie Cain Jr. In 2007 he and his partner was rearended by an intoxicated driver while sitting in their squad car on duty. I found out that my husband had been in a accident not through a phone call, not by knock on my door from his lieutenant, but because I was watching TV of a news crew chopper flying over a accident involving a Memphis City Officer. As the news crew flew over I knew it was my husband because of the number on top of his squad car. My children saw this as well and became overwhelmed with fear. Finally my husband asked the EMT to notify his family. After hearing my husbands voice me and the kids were somewhat calmed. Little did we know the amounts of pain and horror that would later occur. We were sent to doctor after doctor and told that they really arent sure what the problem is. After several weeks and months of missing work and due to debilitating migraines accompanied with extreme shoulder and neck pain we were told by a neurosurgeon that he needed surgery to correct the problem. The day of surgery, six months after the accident, I was told it would only last an hour and he would go home to his family that night. After six plus hours of sitting in a waiting area terrified because it had been more than an hour, the doctor came out and told me that the damage was far worse than he had expected and that my husband would never be the same. He ended up spending 4 days in the hospital hooked up to a pain pump that barely kept him comfortable. After taking him home his body began rejecting the surgery and the stitches causing even more pain. After almost a year of rehabilitation he was finally released to return to the job that he so dearly loved. He always said, if I can just change just one persons life, stop a kid from joining a gang or make a difference in my City then every horrible thing Ive seen and been through is worth it. After being back on duty for just over a year, he was answering a domestic violence call. As my husband tried to detain a male suspect, my husband was hit in the neck where he had surgery. This incident caused more problems with my husbands initial injury. Eventually he was forced to go through the process of a Medical Retirement because the pain was just too severe for him to adequately do his job as a Memphis Police Officer. My husband was placed on workmans compensation yet again which finally ran out and our family went without a paycheck for 6 months. I ended up losing my job as well from exsseive absences because I had to care for my husband and because I had also been involved in an ATV accident in 2009 which caused even more stress on the family because my children were forced to help with their parents care. This left our household without an income period. Finally my husbands Medical Retirement came through, but not before we lost the house my husband was able to purchase while he was an able bodied Memphis Police Officer! I have to point out that this is not the only negative way my husband was affected while serving the City of Memphis as a Law Enforcement Officer. I can vividly remember all the times I had to hold my husband as he cried because of various calls he had responded to. The call involving children left in their home by themselves where the home was filled with animal feces and urine. The house was crawling with roaches and the children hadnt been bathed or eaten in days, however the parents were not to be found. The call of a six year old female who was just raped by her father and my husband sat with and held her hand at LeBohneur Childrens Hospital while waiting on the Doctors to perform the rape exam which traumatized the child even more. My husband came home that night and held his own six year old daughter not understanding how a father could do such a thing. The call of a dead person who had been in his home for over two weeks in the Memphis summer heat, where I was forced to make him remove his uniform in the garage because the smell was so horrible it permeated his clothing. The call of his partner screaming over the radio because he had just been shot in the stomach and had shot the suspect in the head, killing him. These are just a few of the countless nightmarish calls my husband responded to in just ten years as a Police Officer for The City of Memphis, giving him PTSD and causing him to have severe nightmares to which I am forced to wake him up and hold him until he calms down and the anxiety stops. Now ask yourself Memphis City Council, do any of you have to do this on a nightly basis to your spouse because the things your spouse had seen were too much to handle? No, you sit in a secured office all day (secure because of officers like my husband) in your suit and tie and make judgment calls that better your pocketbook and career! Ask yourself, do people want to shoot at you because of your job? I think not! When my husband was able to retire from the City of Memphis on a Medical Retirement he was promised a full pension at 60% of his base salary tax free and full medical coverage for him & his family for the rest of his life, which would go to me and the kids if anything were to happen to him! This was a promise made to him and his family for giving ten years of his life and giving up his health when he was injured while protecting the citizens of Memphis, which includes all City Council members and their families! We now have to explain to our 17 year old daughter, who is getting ready to start her senior year in high school, why we cannot afford to help her out with college. We have to explain to our two sons why we cannot take anymore vacations. We also have to explain to our youngest son, who has asthma, why he might not be able to get his meds that help him to breathe. My husband doesnt know how he is going to survive without medical coverage since workmans compensation only pays for two years after retirement even though he was injured while protecting citizens like you! I pray for you daily, that God will forgive you for what you have done to my family and so many others. All I want is for you to honor the promise that the City of Memphis made to my husband when he retired! Respectfully, Lisa M Cain Wife of Retired Officer
Posted on: Sun, 13 Jul 2014 00:17:58 +0000
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