Officer excels as a motorcyclist and finding trouble with trucks In his 14 years on the Fairfax County police force, Dan Johnson has returned hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of stolen property to stores, placed in the top 10 in the police rodeo each year, and saved an officer’s life.
Johnson, a Silver Medal of Valor honoree in 2008 and a Mid-Atlantic Motorcycle Skills Competition finalist 14 times, said he always knew he would be a police officer.
“Ever since an officer walked into my elementary school in his uniform, I knew who I wanted to be,” Johnson said.
He was awarded the Silver Medal of Valor in 2008 for saving a choking officer’s life by performing the Heimlich maneuver. The choking officer walked in off the street, hoping Johnson would know what to do. “I just reached my arms around him and the food that was stuck just popped right out,” Johnson said.
His first arrest was a foot pursuit when he was a member of the Christmas Anti-Theft team, which stretched out to four years spent tracking down shoplifters, counterfeiters and stolen vehicles.
“I tackled him,” Johnson said of his first collar.
Johnson went to police motorcycle training school in 2000 and has since taught others, earning a Team Excellence Award for motorcycle training. He was sent across the country to compete has placed as high as second nationally.
Since 2007, Johnson inspects trucks as part of the traffic division. He finds violations that range from hazardous materials violations to illegal wheels or tires, and he has made multiple arrests.
“We found child pornography one time,” Johnson said. “He got three years. ”
On Thursday, as a part of the monthly, one-day Commercial Vehicle Safety Alliance’s RoadCheck 2011, Johnson and his eighth-member team inspected 61 trucks. They found 145 violations and put 22 vehicles out of service.
That makes 2,000 violations the MCS unit discovered so far this year. And sometimes the problems aren’t with the truck, but the person driving it.
“We often find that the truck driver’s license is suspended, or that he’s wanted in another state,” Johnson said.
