Stepping up to help a fellow officer.
The Metro Nashville Police Department honored a UK police officer recently after he jumped into action to help a Nashville officer who was being attacked by a suspect trying to get to his gun on the side of the road.
The scary incident happened in the overnight hours on May 8, when MNPD Officer Peter Kinsey spotted 43-year old Joseph Rainey walking down an exit ramp towards interstate 440. Kinsey stopped to tell Rainey that he couldn’t be walking on the interstate, but the man didn’t listen and continued towards the busy highway. The officer eventually parked his car and and began to follow after Rainey.
According to a statement from MNPD, Rainey continued to ignore the officer’s commands and began fighting with him on the interstate ramp. Eventually the two ended up on the ground, and MNPD says that Rainey was eventually able to get a finger into the officer’s holster and fire a shot from his gun.
While backup was on the way, a police officer from the UK who had just arrived in Nashville for vacation just happened to be driving by and saw what was happening. The British officer, later identified as Taylor Johanson of the Kent Police Department, stopped to help his struggling Nashville counterpart, and was able to get Rainey off of Kinsey.
At that point Kinsey was able to deploy his Taser, which allowed the two police officers from opposite sides of the world to subdue the suspect until help arrived.
Both Rainey and Kinsey were checked out a local hospital before being released, and Rainey was taken to jail and charged with aggravated assault on a police officer, resisting arrest and unlawfully being a pedestrian on the interstate system. He’s currently being held on a $77,000 bond, as well as charges from another county.
Well naturally the Nashville police were thankful to Johanson for stepping in and helping out, and today they were able to honor the UK officer before he returned home.
According to Johanson, he had just gotten off an 8 hour flight when he saw the scuffle on the side of the road:
“It took me a second to realize what was going on, and then as I ran over I could see the male on top of the officer assaulting him quite badly, so I decided to jump in and tackle him and take him off.”
Johanson says he has family in Nashville, and his parents used to live here as well, so he was in town for “a week to relax” – though it didn’t start off very relaxing. But he says the opportunity to help out a fellow officer meant a lot to him:
“I know that feeling of waiting, when you can hear the sirens coming and it feels like the longest time. So to be able to speed that up and give him the help that he needed, it means a lot to me as well to be able to help.”
Officer Kinsey also spoke about the incident, calling it “the closest near-death experience” he’s had as an officer, and “probably the most traumatic.” He says that his only thought was trying to prevent the suspect from getting his gun, and described the relief that went through his mind when Johanson showed up:
“I’m just very happy and was very surprised when he came. When I heard him say the first things out of his mouth I was like, ‘Oh.'”
Johanson was presented with some gifts by Kinsey and MNPD Chief John Drake before heading back to England. And hopefully he was able to relax and enjoy the rest of his time in Nashville – even if it got out to quite the eventful start.
