Robert Bronsdon (Hollywood Rob) August 2019
A few days back I received some shade for leaving SLO out of my story on a trip down from Monterey to LA. You might surmise that I hold some animosity to the good people of San Luis Obispo but I can assure you that that is not the case.
As you now know, the great city of SLO not only has several perfectly serviceable gas stations, and all the fast food you can eat, but they also boast of some of the best apple pie you can ever hope to eat. In addition to these culinary delights, apparently, they can also offer up a constabulary that is second to none. In addition to a wonderful police force led by top notch career officers, apparently you can pick up a free gun in any El Pollo Loco in town. In addition to the gun you can also acquire a free belt, holster, and most likely (although this is not guaranteed) several magazines of spare bullets.
San Luis Obispo police chief loses gun she left in restroom
San Luis Obispo’s police chief says she left her gun in a restaurant restroom and it was immediately stolen.
She issued a public apology over the incident and said she’s grateful a child didn’t find the gun.
Deanna Cantrell said she realized within minutes that she’s left the gun in a stall in an El Pollo Loco restroom, and when she went back to retrieve the firearm, it was was gone. The San Luis Obispo Police Department is looking for a man authorities suspect may have taken it.
Also in the news:
- L.A. County sheriff’s detective pleads guilty to sexually assaulting 15-year-old girl
- Gun leads to Oxnard gang member’s arrest, cops say
Cantrell obtained video from the business that showed a man entering the same restroom minutes after she’d left, according to the city.
Police are asking for the public’s assistance in locating the man. He is described as balding, and was wearing a black jacket, lime green and blue striped shorts, and sunglasses.
Cantrell acknowledged her actions were “irresponsible and careless,” adding that she has “no excuses for my actions.”
“I talk about transparency, and therefore want to be as transparent as possible when we do things right as well as when we do not,” Cantrell said. “I believe in our relationships being built on trust, and hope that this furthers that goal. I inadvertently left my firearm in a public restroom and it has not been recovered.”
Two other people separately entered the same restroom after Cantrell left it, a boy about 10 years old and an adult man. Both remained in the restaurant and were questioned, saying they hadn’t seen a firearm, the city said.
The man in the lime green and blue striped shorts remained in the restroom for about two minutes and then left El Pollo Loco through the same entrance he came in from, according to surveillance.
City Manager Derek Johnson said in a statement that Cantrell apologized to him, and they spoke personally.
“I wanted to reassure our community that protecting the public’s safety is our number one priority,” Johnson noted.
Johnson added that Cantrell will voluntarily attend training on firearm safety practices and vowed to use the incident as a training opportunity for all officers in the department.
“Having carried a firearm safely for 25 years, she is committed to serving as an example of the level of vigilance that must be maintained at all times, regardless of experience or rank,” Johnson said.
From reports by the San Luis Obispo Tribune, via Tribune Content Agency, and The Associated Press
Rob back:
As of this morning, the weapon has been returned to Ms Cantrell and no charges are going to be set against old skeeter. Now this is remarkable for several reasons. First off, let me say that I don’t open carry so I don’t have a tactical belt (well I do) and I am not a woman so I can’t comment on how a woman would handle her firearm and belt if she had to pee. Let’s say that it is normal for a tactical belt to be removed if one has to sit down in the toilet and that both men and women would need to do this several times a day. Having recognized the difficulty implicit in using a tactical belt to carry around your tiny little Glock 380 and the two or three boxes of 380 bullets that it would require to be make the weapon effective in a fire fight, let’s just say that over the years, 25 of them, she has had to do this roughly 30,000 times. How distracted does one have to be to override 30,000 repetitions of muscle memory?
Then, realizing that the gun was missing she apparently went back to find it gone. It is alleged in this morning article that she then created a youtube video explaining that the gun was gone after she left it in the bathroom at El Pollo Loco. And here it is.
In the video she explains that she unclipped her holster and left the gun and holster in the restroom. I don’t know for sure, but here is a picture of Deanna wearing her sidearm and tactical belt.
Now, I don’t want to throw shade on Deanna. It’s not fair to do so as she made a mistake, owned it, and I am very sure that she has suffered the consequences. Losing your gun in an El Pollo Loco is bound to be something that is going to be brought up in the next performance review. It will be hard to argue for a raise for a while.
What I do want to point out is the relaxed attitude that leads to not only taking your gun off your belt in El Pollo Loco, but then leaving it behind. This attitude is bred in an environment where very little ever happens beyond the drinking parties at the local college. Nothing ever happens in SLO. That is why it is called SLO. Nobody ever goes there, they go through there. It is a lovely place to be from…far from.
So if you want to go to SLO, do stop in and have some chicken with Deanna. I am sure that she will want some cheering up for some time to come. And if you ever get pulled over in SLO, you might as well ask the officer who pulls you over if he approves of removing ones weapon in a restroom. I’m just sayin’.
If I ever have to move to California, San Luis Obispo is on my list. That’s because Jim Rockford once had to drive all the way up there. He was even madder than when he had to go to Oxnard. I could never live in a place named after an ox’s nards.
Pismo Beach was a great place too — 40 years ago.
I grew up in Oxnard…tho like Pequiste said about Pismo….it was a fine town to grow up in…….40 years ago. SLO still in a nice town. I guess Hollywood Rob needs the whole urban feel (shit on the sidewalk, WalkingDead vagrants everywhere, sharing the freeways with MS-13 gang members, etc. I’d rather not. To each his own.
Of course it is JD. But it isn’t called SLO for nothing. And, of course, that’s not really the point of the post is it. The point is that a woman police chief left her weapon in a restroom.
Another feel good story.
“I talk about transparency, and therefore want to be as transparent as possible when we do things right as well as when we do not,” Cantrell said. “I believe in our relationships being built on trust, and hope that this furthers that goal. I inadvertently left my firearm in a public restroom and it has not been recovered.”
Followed by-
“Having carried a firearm safely for 25 years, she is committed to serving as an example of the level of vigilance that must be maintained at all times, regardless of experience or rank,” Johnson said.
This is what I refer to as poopy talk. It’s a circular, meandering, nothing burger filled with platitudes and sophistry.
What did she do right? And why would she even think of saying something so disconnected from reality as her first point? And it doesn’t matter if she carried it safely for 1,000 years, on this occasion she was reckless, negligent, irresponsible and careless. If you only run over and kill one child in your driving career it would be imprudent to send out a spokesman to talk about what a kick ass safe driver you are and how you serve as an example of safe driving, wouldn’t it?
But then again for me, physiognomy. That’s not a person you hire to run your PD, that’s a person you keep a wary eye on because something’s obviously wrong with her. She looks like the type that might accidentally leave their service revolver in a bathroom stall.
Whadda ya mean? That LBGTQ+ (mean faced, clipped hair dyke) look exemplifies the best in post-moderne EEO Law Enforcement leadership (for Crazyfornya that is.)
I’m surprised the chief is not wearing the haircut “high and tight.” Pretty close tho’.
But the chief still sports four star rank and that is what makes the chief competent for the gig in lovely SLO by the sea.
She has dude hands. End of story.
SLO can afford to indulge in silly fantasies by hiring an absent minded dyke as police chief (who was a keynote speaker at a recent Womyn’s March, btw), cause not much goes on there anyhow. Other cities have more serious shit to deal with.
I wonder what the rank n file thinks about the new (2016) chief of police?
I can sympathize with needing to take your gun off to use the bathroom. I carry everywhere I go and its always in the appendix position. Either a G19 with spare mag in a T-rex arms side car, or if I really don’t want anyone to be able to see it, or due to clothing Im wearing, Ill occasionally carry the G43 in a little blackhawk holster also in AIWB position, and just carry the extra mag in my offhand pocket. When I have to use the bathroom, I almost never have to ‘sit down’ since i try REALLY hard to only do that in certain places, but I do have to take it off to take a leak. I always go in stalls, even if I have to wait for one to open up. The G19 in the sidecar, I take the whole holster out and sit it on the sink, back of the toilet, toilet paper holder, whatever if there’s one in the stall where I don’t have to worry about anyone else seeing or especially trying to grab it. If there’s nothing good in the stall that I won’t risk having it fall to the ground, I stick the whole rig underneath my arm in my armpit and hold it there while I pee. The little glock I just unclip the holster from my belt and stick the whole thing (gun in holster) in my pocket, so in neither case is the trigger ever exposed.
I have been carrying like that for years, done this a whole bunch of times, and never, not once, have I ever even come close to walking out of the bathroom or stall without my gun. Never. Someone with that lack of situational awareness should not be a cop, and probably shouldn’t have a gun at all.
Lets examine the possiblities from her inattention. A kid goes in there, picks it up, shoots himself or someone else. Hell, just blows a ‘harmless’ hole in the wall and no one is hurt. Now imagine a civilian did it. THis would be all over the news as proof we can’t be trusted with guns, only the police should have them. She does this and gets to keep her job. A civilian carrying a pistol, especially in california, would have charges pressed against them and likely lose their right to carry over this. She not only escapes all this and gets to keep her job…
Great comment, Gator…
Just to address your last paragraph, in case you’ve been too far down in the swamp, there are two different rules of law; one for the serfs, and one for the king’s men
annuit coeptis novus ordo seclorum-
haha, a good grant writer for SLO will probably be able to get a butt load of ‘free gov’ money to properly address the required training recommended to prevent such an error in the future.
Extra-special toilet training.
Key statement. “She left her gun in the restroom” We get what we deserve.
I left my turd in San Francisco.
I actually heard of a Baltimore policeman leaving his gun at a Target checkout counter. He lost his carry privileges at least for a time. But, still…
Let me “throw some shade.” How old are you? I thought you were old enough to avoid using Ebonic terminology. I could hardly slough through your slang filled slop. I’m just sayin’.
OTOH, I had fun mocking your comment with the snootiest sounding rendition – We stopped in Paso Robles for lunch, at Snobbo’s.
Well Ethiopian Colon, we all know it’s all about you.
Did you know the majority of black slaves came from west Africa?
Did you know 94% of them went to Brazil, Mexico, and the Caribbean and 6% went the CSA?
The “related articles” are worse.
https://www.vcstar.com/story/news/local/communities/camarillo/2019/07/10/l-a-county-sheriffs-detective-admits-sexually-assaulting-teen/1694607001/
I almost lost a gun one single time. Off body carry in a jacket. Never again.
sorta like…
How does this dumb bitch still have a job? Can you IMAGINE the hellish consequences of losing your permitted firearm in a restaurant bathroom in CA? Like Orwell wrote; some animals are more equal than others!
Even at my old age I can not imagine being that absent-minded….
Charles Whitman never shot anyone….Fake…
“Deanna Cantrell said she realized within minutes that she’s left the gun in a stall in an El Pollo Loco restroom, and when she went back to retrieve the firearm, it was was gone.”
“Cantrell obtained video from the business that showed a man entering the same restroom minutes after she’d left, according to the city.”
“Two other people separately entered the same restroom after Cantrell left it, a boy about 10 years old and an adult man.”
Dyke cop identifies as a guy?
Three SLO guys identify as women?
“Unisex” loos in SLO?
Which one applies?
I’m so confused.
lost her gun – lost her shit
she lost her weapon, she never had a gun, therefore she can’t loose one.
This is CA. You can not assume that she never had a gun. She might actually still have a gun.
I lost my Top Gun Paula. Snnfff.
But only police should be allowed to own or carry guns…..LMAO.
Don’t be a shit beaner baby. It doesn’t become you and places you at a disadvantage. As long as you continue to promote your antifa manifesto you will be restricted to the bottom of the comment floor getting upvoted by your antifa buddy maggie and any of the other comrades that you can drag in for a quick drive by. Nobody cares what you think any more.
Stay classy, Robbo.