Heroes Live Forever Podcast

McLean, VA (December 23, 2025) - On February 25, 1987, while guarding a prisoner at a hospital, Miami County (OH) Sgt. Robert L. “Bobby” Elliott was shot and killed. The prisoner escaped but was soon tracked down and died by suicide during a shootout with police. Everyone who worked with Bobby remembers the same thing—his “heart of gold,” as one colleague said. A nurse remembers the night before h...

McLean, VA (December 16, 2025) - Around 4 a.m. on December 14, 1951, Detroit Police Officer Stanley J. Jerlecki and his partner responded to a burglary at a jewelry store. As he pursued one of the suspects, gunfire erupted. Officer Jerlecki was struck, but in his final moments he returned fire, fatally wounding the adult suspect. The second suspect — a juvenile — was captured and later convicted o...

McLean, VA (December 9, 2025) - On January 8, 2002, a woman called the Beaufort County, South Carolina, Sheriff’s Office to say that her friend was being held by a man against her will and “needed help.” Lance Corporal Dana L. Tate Sr. and Corporal Dyke “A.J.” Coursen raced to the scene. When Deputies Tate and Coursen arrived, the man hid in a bedroom closet with a high-powered SKS assault rifle....

McLean, VA (December 2, 2025) - On September 25, 1992, Minneapolis Police Officer Jerome “Jerry” Haaf Sr., 53, was near the end of his shift when he stopped by a favorite cop hangout to have a cup of coffee and finish some paperwork. As he sat at the table, two gang members entered from behind. They were members of the Vice Lords street gang. Without warning, they opened fire, shooting Jerry twice...

McLean, VA (November 25, 2025) - On the afternoon of November 1, 1950, two Puerto Rican nationalists seeking independence for their island from U.S. control, launched an attack on Blair House where President Truman was living while the White House was under renovation. Their goal was to either kidnap or assassinate the President to draw international attention to their cause. Standing guard was Pr...

McLean, VA (November 18, 2025) - On July 24, 1998, a mentally deranged man drove from Montana to Washington, D.C. with death and destruction on his mind. He was carrying a .38 caliber revolver and thoughts clouded by delusion. At 3:40 p.m., he set off the metal detector at the Document Door on the East Front of the U.S. Capitol. When Capitol Police Officer Jacob “J.J.” Chestnut asked him to step b...

McLean, VA (November 11, 2025) - On July 17, 1975, two Florham Park, New Jersey, police officers—Patrolman Robert Hauptman and Det. Francis “Frank” Dailey Jr.—were killed in an airplane crash while returning from a reconnaissance flight searching for a marijuana crop. They were close to landing when their airplane stalled and then clipped a tree. They crashed to the ground and both officers were k...

McLean, VA (November 4, 2025) - On February 24, 1983, Albuquerque Police Officer Gerald “Jerry” Cline responded to a call at a low-rent motel. A man was threatening others with a rifle. Soon after he arrived on the scene, Officer Cline was ambushed and killed by a single rifle shot fired at point-blank range. His killer was soon arrested and sentenced to death—a sentence that was commuted to life...

McLean, VA (October 28, 2025) - On August 14, 1958, San Francisco lost one of its own. Police Officer Barry Ronald Rosekind, just 30 years old, was killed in the line of duty while pursuing a speeding vehicle on his police motorcycle. His watch ended, but his legacy had only begun. Barry left behind his wife, Marilyn, and two young sons, Mark and Gary. Marilyn was one of the founders and longtime...

McLean, VA (October 21, 2025) - Ashley Guindon once wrote in her high school yearbook, “Live for something rather than die for nothing.” It summed up the way she chose to live her life—why she became a Marine Corps Reservist and a Prince William County (VA) police officer. Her decision to become a police officer was, in part, a tribute to her father. He had once dreamed of joining the force himsel...

McLean, VA (October 14, 2025) - Lt. Joseph Petrosino wasn’t just a New York City police officer—he was a trailblazer. Born in Italy, he immigrated to America as a child. He became the first Italian-speaking officer in the department’s history, and he quickly rose through the ranks. He founded the NYPD’s famed Italian Squad, a unit dedicated to investigating the Mano Nera, or Black Hand, a notoriou...

McLean, VA (October 7, 2025) - Christy Lynne Hamilton’s life-long dream was to follow in her father’s footsteps and become a Los Angeles police officer. But for many years that dream was put on hold while Christy raised her two children, Kelley and Steven. Finally, with her children grown, 45-year-old Christy Hamilton became a rookie police officer with the Los Angeles Police Department. But on Fe...

McLean, VA (September 30, 2025) - On the afternoon of June 17, 2004, four Birmingham (AL) police officers went to arrest Nathaniel Woods on a misdemeanor domestic violence charge. After confronting Woods inside an apartment, a struggle ensued and Woods broke free. Another man inside the home opened fire with a SKS semi-automatic rifle. The gunfire was relentless and Officers Carlos Owen, Charles R...

McLean, VA (September 23, 2025) - By all accounts, Brian T. Gibson, 28, was a top cop, one of the Washington, D.C. Metropolitan Police Department’s very finest. On a quiet winter night on February 5, 1997, this husband and father of two was sitting in his marked patrol car at a traffic light when a man walked up and fatally shot him four times at point-blank range. It was a senseless act of violen...

McLean, VA (September 16, 2025) - Jeremy Henwood was a United States Marine combat veteran. He survived two tours of duty in Iraq and another in Afghanistan. And when he returned from Afghanistan as a Captain in the Marine Reserves, he resumed his duties as a San Diego police officer. Sadly, it was this other war—the war on crime and terror being waged on the streets of America—that would claim th...

McLean, VA (September 9, 2025) - As we prepare to commemorate the 24th anniversary of 9/11, the deadliest day in law enforcement history, CBB founder and president shared some of his memories from that fateful day and the year that followed. He described a visit to “Ground Zero”—the site of the attacks in New York City—one week after 9/11. One of his most poignant moments came on the ride out of G...

McLean, Va (August 25, 2025) - Many have come to know it simply as the “Howard Johnson Tragedy.” Motivated by racial hatred and anti-police sentiment, a lone gunman by the name of Mark Essex, launched a violent rampage targeting law enforcement and civilians. When his week-long rampage was over, 10 people were dead, including five New Orleans police officers. Thirteen other first responders and ci...

McLean, VA (August 19, 2025) - The history books have immortalized the event as the “Santa Claus Bank Robbery.” It occurred on December 23, 1927, in the central Texas town of Cisco. The robbery is one of the most infamous crimes in Texas history, having resulted in the largest manhunt ever seen in the state. After being freed from prison for an earlier bank robbery, Marshall Ratliff hatched a plan...

McLean, VA (August 12, 2025) - On February 20, 1989, Virginia State Trooper Jerry Hines was working the late shift when he spotted a motorist driving erratically. Suspecting that the driver was intoxicated, the 28-year police veteran pulled the vehicle over. He contacted the local police dispatcher to run a registration check on the car and to request backup. But when another trooper arrived on th...

McLean, VA (July 29, 2025) - As a night marshal in Pulaski County, Missouri, Dotson A. Sutton protected and befriended thousands of soldiers and their families stationed at Fort Leonard Wood during World War II. He would frequently have his photograph taken with the soldiers and most would come looking for him before being shipped overseas just to say goodbye to the man they affectionately called...

McLean, VA (July 22, 2025) - On the night of August 28, 1985, with 14 years of distinguished police service under his belt, New Jersey State Police Det. Albert J. Mallen Sr. was working on one of the biggest narcotics cases in state history. A drug raid was planned. The target was a modest home in a New Jersey suburb, which was suspected of being one of the laboratories in a multimillion-dollar me...

McLean, VA (July 15, 2025) - On May 4, 1886, a pro-labor crowd had gathered in Chicago’s Haymarket Square to rally in support of an eight-hour workday. Near the end of the rally, around 10:30 pm, a large number of police arrived and ordered the rally to disperse. That’s when an anarchist tossed a bomb into the path of the advancing police. It exploded, killing Patrolman Mathias Degan, and severely...

McLean, VA (July 7, 2025) - More law enforcement officers are assaulted and injured responding to domestic disturbance calls than any other circumstance. And many of those calls have resulted in deadly encounters for the officers involved. Oxnard, California Police Officer John Adair was shot and killed on October 7, 1980, while trying to protect a woman from her enraged husband. Officer Adair’s w...

On March 26, 1916, Federal Correctional Officer Andrew Turner was stabbed to death by an inmate at the Leavenworth Federal Penitentiary in Kansas. His killer, Robert Stroud, was sentenced to hang. However, President Woodrow Wilson commuted his sentence to life imprisonment. Stroud went on to live nearly another 50 years in the Federal prison system and developed a fascination with birds. Shortly b...

McLean, VA (June 24, 2025) - On October 3, 1994, an elderly man named James Monsante, who had been grieving over the death of his wife earlier that year, was on the verge of suicide. His son contacted police and told them about the stash of guns his father kept in the home. After Monsante refused to be taken to the hospital for an evaluation, the New Hampshire State Police SWAT team, led by Sgt. J...