Losing a leg on duty might sour some people on a career in law enforcement.
But Pieter Lucas, a 23-year-old Howard County auxiliary officer struck by a sport utility vehicle while directing traffic at a crash scene in 2005, has returned to his post, 17 months after doctors amputated his left leg above the knee.
He returned with his hope of becoming a sworn officer intact.
“I?m going to give it a shot,” Lucas said Friday morning, his first day back.
If his resume is any measure of his resolve, he has more than a shot.
Have you ever juggled responsibilities as a full-time student, volunteer firefighter, auxiliary police officer and a part-time employee for the Howard County Department of Parks and Recreation? Better, have you ever inspired a state law?
“He?s a driven individual,” said Capt. John McKissick, head of the department?s special operations unit, which oversees the auxiliary program. “It was a tragic event that would have ended a lot of people?s aspirations ? but not Pieter.”
Lucas speaks of his injury as if it were an inconvenience, no more a bother than a head cold.
“It?s something you got to deal with,” said Lucas, sitting in a desk chair in jeans and a sweatshirt, his right leg casually draped over his prosthetic left one.
It?s his second leg. He wore the first one for about nine months. It was a heavy, awkward thing, meant to coax his body into a life balanced on a prosthetic limb, he said.
His new leg, which he?s had for a few weeks, is outfitted with a hydraulic cylinder at the knee and made of lighter fibers ? light enough to run on, he hopes.
Lucas, who is expecting to earn his degree in criminology and criminal justice from University of Maryland, College Park, this month, passed the physical and written portions of the department?s application about two weeks before the accident.
But department policy requires a candidate to retake the exam after a year.
That means Lucas must run 1.5 miles in 12 minutes and 51 seconds, Sherry Llewellyn, a police spokeswoman said.
He will be the first applicant in the department?s history with a prosthetic limb.
“This is uncharted territory,” Llewellyn said. “But he?ll certainly be eligible to take the test and to apply, and we?ll evaluate him as we do any other candidate.”
Lucas already has called a therapist who specializes in teaching people how to run on prosthetic legs, he said.
So, when will he apply again?
“Whenever I?m ready,” Lucas said.
For now, he said, he?s concentrating on his recovery and his duties as an auxiliary officer, which include tagging and towing abandoned vehicles, parking enforcement ? and directing traffic.
“Yeah, yeah, why not? I don?t remember any of it anyway, so I?m not scared,” Lucas said, grinning. When the Chevrolet Tahoe struck Lucas and pinned him to his parked Chevrolet Blazer, he lost consciousness. He was in a coma for three days, he said.
Lucas filed for workers? compensation benefits, but Howard County contested it because he wasn?t an employee. The county eventually agreed to cover his medical costs, butstate Sen. Allan Kittleman, R-District 9, introduced a bill last session to prevent future conflicts.
The bill, which passed, provides workers? compensation benefits to Howard?s auxiliary police officers. The law ? named the Pieter Lucas Act ? goes into effect in October.
