The radar flashed 88 in a 55, and I already had the citation written in my head before I reached the driver’s window. The man behind the wheel looked to be in his late fifties, wearing a faded delivery shirt, his hands gripping the steering wheel so tightly his knuckles had turned white. I asked for his license, but instead he whispered that his daughter was at the hospital.

His name was Robert. His daughter Emily had gone into labor unexpectedly while he was finishing a delivery route. Her mother had passed away six years earlier. The baby’s father had left months ago. Robert was the only family she had nearby. A nurse had called and told him Emily kept asking for her dad. Suddenly the terrified man in front of me did not look like a reckless driver inventing an excuse. He looked like a father afraid he was about to arrive too late.

I still could not let him continue driving nearly ninety miles an hour through lunchtime traffic. One mistake could hurt him or an innocent family. So I made a decision they never really prepare you for in training. Stay directly behind me, I told him. If I stop, you stop. If you lose me, you slow down. I radioed dispatch, requested priority movement to County Memorial, turned on my lights and siren, and started clearing intersections one at a time. Robert stayed behind me exactly as instructed.