Summary of John Mattingly's 12 Seconds in the Dark

Book excerpt: Please note: This is a companion version & not the original book. Sample Book Insights: #1 The author was the first officer to arrive at a house where a small child had been shot. The author helped render first aid to the child, but she was already dead. The mother explained that her 16-year-old son had been selling drugs and having guns for years, and that she had kicked him out of the house previously because of it. #2 I was 18 years old in 1991, and I felt invincible. We were on our senior trip in high school, eating at a Pizza Hut somewhere in southeast Texas, when I saw a female employee arguing with a guy I assumed was her boyfriend. I jumped to my feet and ran outside to confront the guy, or should I say, the coward. #3 I was very fortunate. I was from Portland, but Portland didn’t raise me. My parents are very conservative Christians, and I was sheltered from many of the pitfalls that growing up in an impoverished area presented. #4 My first sixteen weeks of training were in the Portland neighborhood where I grew up. I worked with the cops I had seen on a daily basis at the convenience stores or McDonald’s, and I had to lock up some people I had played basketball with at the community parks.