A rambunctious deer had Twin Cities area police officers ducking and dashing as it raced and leapt about outside headquarters one night last month, in a scene of wildlife wackiness that has thrust one cop into viral stardom territory.
Rosemount police officials decided the parking lot surveillance video was just too much fun to keep in-house, said Chief Mikael Dahlstrom. So on Friday the department posted the footage, drawing more than 100,000 views as of Saturday afternoon.
Soon after the doe bounded over the parking lot’s 10-foot-high fencing, Dahlstrom said, officers looking outside found the doe staring back at them.
Out they went to redirect the deer toward the newly opened gate. As the pavement corralling continued, officer Jon Klecker had the closest of calls: The doe reached top speed and sailed toward the first-year cop with front legs fully extended.
“At the last second, [Klecker] decided to duck, and we were pretty thankful that he did,” Dahlstrom said of his officer’s instinctual crouch. “He had hoof prints, deer hair and grass stains on the back of his vest.”
The doe eventually found its way to freedom, which in turn freed the officers themselves to go back to filling out their end-of-shift reports.
Dahlstrom said one of his younger officers with social media skills got ahold of the video and worked it up to Akon’s “Locked Up” for the department’s annual awards banquet, on the same day as the deer encounter.
While law enforcement award presentations routinely bring emotionally heavy accounts of officers’ actions, the video was shown “to lighten the mood,” the chief said.
