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THIRTY-THREE YEARS: The Unfiltered Memoir of a Cop by Rob G Rothwell
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The Author
Rob Rothwell is a Canadian author living in Vancouver, where he was born and raised. He was the second youngest of five siblings. A household full of kids meant the house was always noisy and bustling with life. This was a working family, money was tight, but his parents’ always ensured food was on the table and that the five of them were brought up in a safe loving environment, but an environment of boundaries and rules that distinguished what was right and acceptable and what was not. These core principles instilled into him by his parents has resonated with Rob throughout his whole life both professionally and privately. Nonetheless, there was always room for a little adolescent mischief and teenage rowdiness growing up in the rougher side of Vancouver.
As a child Rob saw himself as a shy introvert boy lacking something of the brazen bravado his elder brothers possessed, he knew this diffident characteristic of his would have to change when he joined the Police, and it did.
Vancouver is a cosmopolitan city that is surrounded by outstanding natural beauty and when you look at the wildlife that lives around that part of Canada you must stop and think, wow what a wonderful place to live. Rob has long embraced the natural beauty around him and is often out in the wilds, cycling, skiing or sailing.
I laughed with Rob the other day as we chatted about how to put this podcast together when rob recalled as a young man, he would go to the gym to carry out arduous exercises to stay Police fit, now a days those rigorous routines have been replaced with stretching classes which he and his wife to whom he has been married to for thirty-eight attend most weeks. Oh, how time can be so cruel for most of us, yet like most of us Rob is still young at heart and that’s all that matters.
A thirty-three-year career in Vancouver Police Department which started when he was twenty exposed Rob to a mixed bag of life, he worked uniform patrol, bicycle patrol, and plain clothes crime task force. He’s been a school liaison officer, a Drug Squad detective, and a member of the Vancouver Integrated Intelligence Unit, to that we add Inspector in charge of the Internal Investigation, Criminal Intelligence and Patrol Support Section of the Vancouver Police. Towards the end of his career, he became the Superintendent overseeing the Criminal Investigation Division for Homicide, Robbery, Arson, Financial Crime and Special Investigations.
I asked Rob for a quirky story, and he sure came up trumps:
Quirky Story
Many years ago, a friend and I were out one evening and decided to grab a bite at a café, which was featuring a new line of herbal teas. I’ve been a diehard coffee drinker, so I thought it was time to expand my ‘sipping’ horizons. I asked the server which herbal tea she would recommend to a novice, she suggested Chamomile due to its ‘delicate’ flavour profile.
She bought over a pipping hot tea pot and instructed us to let it brew for four minutes, before we began sipping. Hmm… delicate for sure, but the flavour was there. Not forward, but softly delightful.
After a while the server returned to refill our pot. She asked how we liked the tea. I delivered an insightful review of its appealing aroma and delectable intricacies, following which the server pulled the lid from the tea pot and exclaimed, ‘oh my God, I forgot to put in the tea bags!’
I think ‘no comment,’ would be a fair assessment here.
Check out our video chat about it here!
The Book
This is an earth-shaking book that takes you behind the scenes of Rob G Rothwell’s life as a cop on the streets of Vancouver. Thirty-three years of policing told through 54 stories each with their own dedicated chapter. Some of the stories are harrowing, some are wholeheartedly profound, whereas others are simply life and death situations. Several of the individual anecdotes are written with great sensitivity, others have an unabashed rawness to them, and some have a satirical edge that will bring a smirk to your, face. All the events and stories are based on true happenings that Rob saw, witnessed and experienced, from high-speed car chases, court room dramas and shenanigans, to deadly undercover operations put in place in order to crackdown and smash the underground drug scene that was so prevalent back then on Vancouver’s downtown streets, run by a ruthless criminal gangs waging a deadly war for control of the illicit market.
Vancouver is a city that Rob has loved all his life and all the painstaking evidence-gathering to put away unsavoury villainous characters was for him at the heart of his thirty-three-year career with the Vancouver Police Department from a young, naïve lad on a bike through to Superintendent commanding the Criminal Investigation Division that oversaw homicide to special investigations. For Rob this was his personal contribution to keeping the streets of Vancouver and all those that walked on them safe, with a touch of tough guy raw humour, compassion and understanding to boot.
So, if you want to know what life as a cop on the streets of Vancouver was like – well read the book, I can’t say fairer than that.
Thank you, Rob, for giving me the opportunity to interview you about your cleverly composed book with all its rawness and humaneness.
IF you want to know more about the author and where you can buy the book from then click on the author’s webpage below or the publisher’s website. You can also click the Amazon link below.
www.friesenpress.com /bookstore/search Rob G Rothwell