(SWITZER, T.J)
+++Name: Thomas James Switzer, Nicknames include Tom, Tee, and Switz
+++Age:Twenty-Nine, DOB: August 21st, 1950
+++Gender: Male
+++Physical appearance: HT: 6’2” WT: 210 lbs | Thomas by physical standards is of the almost purely ideal body weight to height ratio, or BMI. He stands at an impressive six feet, two inches, more than four inches taller than the typical average American white male in 1980 (around 5’10”) He is slender, not incredibly bulky or large in terms of muscle size, but his muscle mass as well, proportionate to his body are ideal especially considering his career field.
+++Identifying Marks: There is a simple black heart tattooed on the dorsal side (rear) of his right wrist approximately 1 in. by 1 in. in addition to a rosary with cross tattooed on his left shoulder which takes up the majority of his arm central to his torso, if viewed from the left.
+++Ethnicity: Mother: Third generation Louisiana Frenchwoman originating out of Palmyra , Father: Austrian, Swiss, English (your ideal mutt) originating out of Pennsylvania.
+++Religion: Devout Roman Catholic
+++Birthplace: North Palmyra, Louisiana
+++Criminal History: No criminal background on file, although several trivial misdemeanor offences were admitted to by Thomas prior to receiving employment within the Orleans Parish Sheriff’s Office in 1972.
+++Military History:
1970-1971 United States Army | Despite having a valid deferment and studying in a field deemed “essential” which both would have made himself an exception to being drafted, decided to complete the required 1 year of service of any Vietnam-deployed draftee. Upon completing basic training with high praise from drill instructors and senior training staff, commissioned as a First Lieutenant within the United States Army Military Police due to already possessing an associate’s degree in the desired field of criminology
Honorably discharged September 1971 after multiple posts on base in Vietnam and seeing limited combat action in cases of invasion and outpost security.
+++Psychological analysis: “When my father backed the claimed that somehow, someway I could change the world when I was not nearly even in Secondary School, I never in a million years thought the two subjects in that sentence, ‘me’ and ‘the world’ would be thoroughly reversed.”
“I became a police officer because I wanted to make a difference for good and to protect and serve. Your typical gung-ho theatrics of wanting to have some sort of meaning in life. A purpose to be described. Growing up in Palmyra there were certainly a couple names I can think of, Officers who I looked up to. I thought all along that law enforcement would be such a black and white job. Hell that’s what you learned in post-secondary school, and the military training for MP, and gosh Police Academy for sure.”
“Now, my mind runs rampant. I can’t keep looking over my shoulder, but why should I? Ultimately, I started doing what they expected of me, rather than what I expected of myself. Never in a million years did I think things would've gotten this bad down here in the Parish. Not in a million years. Like I said, growing up the job seems so simple. It's anything but."
"But, I did as told. How couldn't I? Mom and Pop had done their best to get me a fresh start out of the Bayou, I was working in the upper regions of New Orleans, for the Sheriff's Office. You handled your own stock of shit and vile stench up there, and there were certainly hands that could've used washing no doubt. But never like this."
"I do what I do now, and with the Chief giving me high praise so often, for better or for worse. At this point, it seems trivial than to think of doing otherwise. I used to wear my heart on my sleeve, and with my badge firmly over my heart, as is its customary symbolism pinned on ones' own left breast pocket-area of their uniform. It's gotten so customary to me of doing what is expected of me, versus what I expect of myself, I don't even think of it anymore. Turn a blind eye here, harass an area where you know the Bedards' goons typically hang out in some of the more poorly lit areas of downtown."
"At the end of the day, I try and be as fair and just as possible. Whatever that definition could now be distinguished as, taking into account most parts of my job I have to weigh out how it will affect how the Chief sees me, as any good Police Officer does, but more so how the Fauberts and their top patsies will. Will I get a handshake and smile at Duvet's for busting that bookie that everybody's been complaining about, but facilitating up until he went South, literally and metaphorically speaking, or will I get disapproving glances in Church on Sunday cause I encouraged one of my guys to cite that speeder, only to find out he's somehow married into one of the Fauberts top enforcers."
"Either way, a couple things are clear to me at this point. I've gotten over the sense of watching my back on this job. I'm in the right 100% of the time to this point within North Palmyra, and I've gotten a good grasp on who I can actually do my job with, in terms of citizens, and who I should stay clear of levying any sort of citations or charges against. If it keeps me safe, my fiancee safe, and my family safe in town, I've rationalized certain more "morally questionable" acts and misdoings I've come to within my career thus far. The job does in some ways grant us diplomatic immunity between "jurisdictions" you could call it. I have no problem stopping in for a bite to eat at the Grill, wondering who's watching me and going to report on my actions. The badge gives me that extra sense of security, and I feel its extended to my family. As much as both Departments are thoroughly enveloped and engaged within all of the criminal acts occurring in Palmyra between the two families, one way or another. At the end of the day we're all Police Officers. Can't say I'm buddies with any of the guys on the other side of the bridge, but I also can't convince myself to say I'd help them in a life or death predicament, being a Bedard-backer or not."
"It's certainly got my head spinning still to this day. How I ended up here. How I threw half of my goals and aspirations to achieve true justice out the window. Certainly Nam wasn't doing justice for anyone. At the end of the day, what were we even doing over there? Stopping the spread of Communism? Some of the lesser well liked units and guys over there had done unspeakable things to some of the women. I can't say I would ever be able to look my beautiful honeybun the same coming home, if I had succumbed to doing the vile shit they dipped their hand in. Actually pulled a couple of guys out of some establishments and stuff before they could go that far. Those were the best times. Achieving true justice. Now, it's a see-saw and rollercoaster of emotion and trauma all wrapped up into one. You still have to worry about the common criminal who will gun you down if you catch him doing something that's more than your average petty crime. But then there's the fact these families downright want to kill eachother, although it's been that way for years. Like I said, never thought it'd get this bad, but I limit where I play my hand in it. I've played my hand in enough that when a couple of the older fellas went and collected their social security and retirement pensions, Chief saw fit to appoint me as Sergeant. We've got a more seasoned guy who runs things at night all by his lonesome. I'm constantly picking up wherever I want to pick up time served. That is one thing I will admit to, the Chief gets me overtime wherever I see fit to put pen to paper for it, in order to bulk my money. Got a baby on the way. I've got to do what's expected of me, maybe that's what truly I should've expected from myself this entire time. Fall in line. That's just what we were taught in Nam."
"I wouldn't call myself a sheep but I wouldn't call myself a leader either. I've been able to distinguish the two. The two other guys we've got are no more older than my youngest brother, and not even close to me in age. Couple of youngins. They know what's going on too. They're none-too innocent themselves in all of this. I can't rationalize to say that makes it morally right to dip my hand in the pot, as I've said I've done many a time now to have been able to achieve my rank in the pecking order, second only to the Chief of the North Palmyra Police Department, and his secretary-that-is, but if I can keep these boys from getting so tangled up in a mess they bark up the wrong tree with a Bedard, even if its in our territory, and make sure that by the time I'm ready to retire like the boys I replaced none-too-long ago, then that helps me sleep at night a little less restless than when I toss and turn from this stomach-wrenching stuff."
"I'm a Christian man, I'm a Catholic man, I'm a family man. I'm a police officer, a cop, a constable at heart. I've convinced myself that anything I do here that could be considered dereliction of duty in other departments can be morally abstained because of the risk I would take from not divulging in it. The only person who really gets it is my fiancee. I don't bother to tell mom and pop all the ins and outs of how hard the job is. Black and white. There was always a certain section about that grey area. In Palmyra, that grey area is a couple acres wide compared to the truck-length of that black and white. The thin blue line. Our courage and sacrifice to protect the American people. The line we walk so that others don't have to. In Palmyra, the two sides cross all the time and we're right there to divulge in both sides, those just and corrupt almost constantly.
+++Alignment: Faubert Family, they heavily influence and control the North Palmyra Police Department and as such, Thomas is one of the top Administrative pieces to the Department second the Chief, so he is exposed to and involved in like-it or not with a large portion of the corruption within the Police Department that the Fauberts have them play a hand in, as well as help to keep under wraps from Federal and State investigations.
+++Occupation: Sergeant, North Palmyra Police Department, while Thomas doesn't morally condone most of the operations he turns a blind eye to, or the tasks the Chief has him and his men undertake, such as any sort of raid or operation to eliminate Bedard influence in the Northern jurisdiction, he plays a signifigant hand in it and is directly involved in a large majority of the corruption surrounding the Police Department's role in keeping those criminally sanctioned in the North by and working for the Fauberts, and keeping those who would be allies of the Bedard's within eyes' reach.
+++Biography:
"Growing up in Palmyra, you knew who the rich kid in town was. Not having the luxury of being able to go to different schools, as there was the standard elementary school and then secondary school in Town. A lot of folk call Palmyra as a whole the "City" but that's really not the right terminology for lack of a better term. For an outsider I'm sure the size of Oxbow Parish throws them for a loop. We most certainly have a lot of dwellings, whether they be shacks and stilt houses on the shore-side, or very small homes on the more inland areas."
"Speaking of school, I was actually only a few grades behind Robert Yves Bedard himself, who know customarily wears the title of Police Chief of South Palmyra, which could be equivalent to 'Chief enforcer with a Badge for the Bedard family'. I didn't know him oh so well, but he came from the cream of the crop, one of the now only-two major timber companies in Oxbow Parish. He himself had been an officer in New Orleans from what I had heard over the years once I was back in Palmyra."
"Mom and Pop had Isabelle four years before me, and then David two years after me. Of course both of them never quite left Palmyra other than for school like I was able to, even if it was just for the year in Orleans Parish. Actually, not even a year. They laid me off due to budget cuts in November of 72' and I had gotten hired after attending the Academy in April. Isabelle is a waitress at Duvet's of course. Has been for the past four years now, she's still struggling to find her career, and I worry she never will, but the money definitely flows in on a night when there's entertainment at Duvet's, especially on the weekend. David, who fostered the name 'Jessie' by the end of the grammar school for whatever reason, did four years volunteer in the Marines. Psychologically I could to this day never explain to people how my kid brother had enlisted into the Marines just after his eighteenth birthday. I wouldn't say Jessie was a scholar, but he definitely held college-worthy marks in High School. In the end, I think it was partially him parrying off of me that lead him to that decision.
Mom and Pop were always the middle-class family that kept their nose out of trouble. In the past seventy years crime has admittedly run rampant in Oxbow Parish, although my parents had done good a job as any to make life seem normal. Like I said, I went to school with a Bedard, so life was anything but normal to me. I knew for a fact by the time I had graduated high school there was more to life than just simple trivial, customary living. Crime was fueling the place of which I had originated. I had never taken a liking to playing my hand in crime. Apart from a couple of petty thefts for frivolous items as a juvenile, of which I even had the decency to admit to when the detectives had interrogated me prior to hire in Orleans Parish, I was a clean slate. Few and far between, as I came to realize. Most of my buddies by twenty five had played their hand in some sort of criminal activity in Palmyra, and some had even gotten busted by the police. Up until my late teens I had always seen the police in North Palmyra, once it became divided from the South, as pure, kindhearted, honest individuals who upheld their oath to the Constitution. Once I graduated High School, I had become more and more desensitized, and the rumors and gossip you heard on some of even the most secret proceedings both elitist families were involved in were enough to tell me I needed to get the heck out of dodge for a while."
"My sister had attended Tulane, but I regarded it as far too local. I needed the ability to get out of town for a long while and as such opted to apply for Louisiana State University in Baton Rouge. Upon acceptance, I applied for a partial scholarship to which I was accepted, and granted $100 off of the grand total of my two year tuition costs; $265 and some odd for books among other entities. I had fashioned myself as a local rent-a-cop on campus, making some good side money in between full and part time statuses of enrollment between the years of 1968 and 1970. I had made a decent sum of money and met the love of my life, Rebecca Cumberbatch, who herself was much like my father; a mutt among those who were many still ethnically Southern-style. Maybe that was what of which had drawn me to her. Whatever the case was, we first started dating in the Summer of 69' and had moved into a small apartment in Baton Rouge by 1970 off campus. Upon completion of my Associate's Degree in Criminology and subsequent minor in Public Safety."
"In September of 1970, right as I was underway to go for a Bachelor's in Criminal Justice and Homeland Security, I received a draft notice, and rather than tip my cap for a deferment, and otherwise would have been excluded do to going into an essential service like law enforcement, I elected to accept the draft notice, and became a commissioned man due to the post-secondary credits and the Associates I had gained up to that point. I completed basic by October 1970 and achieved the rank of First Lieutenant with high praise from my drill instructors and subsequent trainers when I went to my trade school for Military Police. We shipped off to Nam by January, where I saw limited combat in mostly minor confrontations. I killed but a lone man in Vietnam, during a base defense of one of our outposts which one night during the hot summer months got ambushed. The weight I bared after that though, after taking a human life, sat with me for a long time. Even today I can think of the exact moment, gripping the M16 I had retrieved from the armory, being as how we only carried our sidearms on base, and firing three rounds one-by-one into the chest of the Vietcong soldier, who wasn't more than twenty-odd years old himself. I remember watching him die right in front of me. By the end of the war I wasn't really sure of why we had gone to Nam and fought that pointless war with them. So many good American men dead as well. In my eyes it seemed like it had been such a great loss of life without a clear and present purpose. They said 'peace, peace, peace' but when peace inevitably lost, the cries for protest following the war fell on def ears."
"When I returned home in September of 1971 after fulfilling my one year of required service for those who were drafted, my family threw me a party upon my return. My brother as I had learned from writing home every so often, had inevitably copied me, as he often had during our younger years; haircuts, interests, styles with clothes, by enlisting into the Marine Corps to fight over in Nam. I was so angry learning that, knowing he easily could've gotten a deferment for attending school, and then seeing some of the most unthinkable things in Nam and then rather hearing of even the more cruel and unusual ones. We had taken to arrest many of enlisted men in Nam for doing unthinkable things to some of the women over there. Some men in country even got into fights with locals, brutalized bars, or butchered men, women, and children alike during inspections, patrols, or city seizures. Nam had most certainly taken a toll on me, and I didn't want Jessie anywhere near it. He had enlisted shortly after I had, once he had turned 18, and then continued up until 1974, almost the end of the war. He completed two deployments to Nam with the Marines. He had come back and changed for the worst. The term jarhead never made so much sense to me after he returned, because he had been an incredibly bright, sophisticated intellectual growing up. By the time he got home, he was an able body with not much of an independent man's thought then to be told to see this, do that. He got into construction, and began working for a local handyman crew who went around building houses, and doing per diem work for businesses and fulfilling contracts for new housing projects."
"I sought employment outside of Palmyra, as I had no intention of going back to that polluted hellhole, much to the dismay and objection of both Mom and Pop. Isabelle I can remember had been doing a stint of administrative clerical work for the South Palmyra Medical Clinic at the time, and was still living at home. They wanted their firstborn son back, after not seeing him for almost four years. But in January of 1972 I set out to find work somewhere East, maybe even the New Orleans Police Department. Then reality hit me. I realized corruption ran rampant in every police department, even ones that weren't exclusively named Palmyra. Eventually I settled on the Orleans Parish Sheriff's Office, and completed their FTO phase after attending a general academy pre-hire just outside of New Orleans. My presence in the Military Police on my record did well for me going into the first few months on the job, and my first FTO was the gold standard of what I had envisioned myself to be as a police officer; fair, honest, impartial, truthful, consistent. Then came the FTOs to follow, many of which I even had witnessed would plant evidence on a stop depending on the demographic or the time of day, they'd entertain more presence in some areas than others, if only to get more favor from local shop owners who would give them "donations" and we would turn a blind eye to more than a handful of a number of different crimes. It was then I realized crime wasn't solely exclusive to Palmyra as I become opinionated over time it was such a terrible place to live, an exception to everywhere else. We had taken a stay in another mid-grade apartment, me and Becca, and were starting to save money in excess, me on the job in uniform, and her doing per diem nursing work, when I was laid off in Orleans."
"After suffering on unemployment from November of 1972 to January of 1973, I returned home to Palmyra, where Mom and Pop had informed me a position had recently opened up in the North's Police Department. I applied, and not surprisingly was appointed, having already an Associates Degree in criminology, and MP experience, but also prior experience, if only for half a year in Orleans Parish. I knew going into the job the corruption that it would involve, and the influence the Flauberts as a family would ultimately have over me. I kept my head down, and admittedly in the first few months tried to keep my nose completely clean. Then I saw how inevitably I'd have to start playing the game, if nothing more than this was my dream job, in my hometown, and I now needed to provide for my new family; me and Rebecca, and keep Mom and Pop free of any danger or reason for either major family to do them any harm. My folks had always been locals, not anywhere to be considered in the top tier elite. My mom had met Pop when he had been an up-and-coming lawyer in New Orleans, taking on civil cases as a defense attorney. She herself had been attending Tulane for a degree in the pharmaceuticals industry, a venture that never was finished because they had Isabelle shortly thereafter following the wedding. Mom now got her income from the crops she sold, as we maintained around 1.5 acres on our property. Mom had turned in her dream of becoming a pharmacist to raise us, and in turn, found her passion and hobby simultaneously by maintaining a huge garden of crops which became an efficient side business. Pop on the other hand, after marrying her, returned back to her hometown with her after having Bell, and took up a job at North Palmyra First Savings & Loan. His knowledge of civil law would translate well into knowing the ins and outs of banking and finance, and Pop was one of the brightest men I had ever had the pleasure of knowing so it's no question as to why he's one of the best bankers of the group there. That was one reason I had gotten the job. As much as Pop never liked to admit he had married into living in a crime-ridden Bayou town, and had kept me honest his whole life, I was certain he saw a ton of dirty money come across his desk or at the very least past his gaze."
"Over the years I succumbed more and more to the pressures of putting my personal feelings and morals to the side, in order to please the senior officers on the payroll, and the Chief as well. After the departure of the Sergeant in 1978, the Chief saw fit to promote me to the role, rather than the last Senior Patrolman on the payroll. He wasn't cut out for the administrative side of the job, and as much as I did dip my hand in the pot every so often, as sometimes it ended up even favoring me in the long run, I wasn't just a goon with a gunbelt and a shiny badge. My ability to be able to have my morals in the back of my head simultaneously with staying in line aided me greatly. I could find ways to cite certain people, or even give verbals or written warnings, while also making sure my procedure with the common criminal who was unaligned, or the petty burglar was at a top-tier standard, and my reports and investigations, as few and far between as they came for we turned a blind eye to most family matters, at least for the Fauberts, never left a stone unturned. The Chief loved it because not only did he look like his department was meeting local and state regulations and expectations, it made it easier then for the other guys to slack off, and be more geared to aide in deliberate sabotage of family efforts against the Bedards. I started to play my hand in the matters more and more, albeit not in line with my morals and the character I attributed to myself of having, nor that which Pop had inspired me to have long ago as a boy, but as I said, my ability to conform and go along with the play-by-play in a lot of the deterring ultimately brought gain to me in ways I didn't necessarily see as ethically immoral or corrupt. I never tried to directly move money, or try my hand in anything that could have a paper trail. But I would enforce in areas where the Bedards were known to have operations on our side of the bridge. It paid off in ways that I could rationalize. I never took money, even if we got it off a perp or in any situation, although I'm sure after I bagged it up as evidence the Chief would then dip his hand and use it to try increase our lackluster budget, or use it to his own personal gain. Whatever the case, it got Rebecca her nursing job at the North Palmyra General Practice in North Palmyra in 1978."
"As of recently, my fiancee became pregnant as of November of this past year, and I proposed on the 1st of the new year at the start of the new decade. My Mom almost killed me realizing I had intercourse prior to marriage, as all three of us were raised as Devout Catholics. But Belle had already been thru so many boyfriends over the years, mom kind of needed to give up that tradition that had run in the family up until our generation. I continue to play my hand in the corruption that is Palmyra as a whole now, while continuing to try and find ways to better us as a Police Department in the North. There is certainly open hostilities between the two major families, and undoubtedly and unfortunately, many locals like Mom and Pop get caught in the crossfire, having to be able to prove allegiance to one side or the other at some point in their time alive in Palmyra. I continue everyday to suffer with the moral conflict, but there are added benefits to at the very least seeming like I go above and beyond to enforce whatever agenda the Fauberts have in mind for the people of the North, and their enemies when they travel across the bridge. With a child on the way I now have a full family to protect and keep safe, and that means at the end of the day I continue on that endlessly running sea-saw of emotion, and balancing doing my duty to the best of my ability and staying true to my morals not only as a person, but as the Police Officer I was trained to be, while simultaneously aiding to enforce the agenda and goals of the Fauberts in one way or another. There's one thing for sure, I'm comfortable right where I am, if I was the Chief, there'd be too much pressure to dive nose first into becoming a full fledged patsy of the Fauberts and conforming to the criminal underworld that essentially controls Palmyra. Sergeant is enough for me. At least I can at some point in my eight to nine hours of tossing and turning say I have room to have some sort of moral responsibility and character in at even the smallest declining of percentage of my job that serves true justice to the common local citizen. 90% of people aren't criminals, they're just good people who make mistakes. We learn this at the Academy. The problem is, I on occasion allow myself to be a card in the Faubert hand of the deck that is the crime that runs society inconspicuously in Palmyra, if nothing more than to allow myself to actually enforce justice and peace in that other 90%."
+++RP Sample: Can provide if necessary, although I do believe in the distant past we've frequented many-a-time roleplays, most of which either your character/s or collective nation/entities foiled 90% of my agendas, plans, or schemes, and for that I in the most sarcastic way, thank you for your service as the foiler of most P2TM RPs of which we've crossed paths.
#ItWillBeDone (DO NOT REMOVE)