SACRAMENTO, Calif. — Casey O’Connor got to know 26-year-old trainee Tara O’Sullivan very well. Because their last names were alphabetically adjacent, during their police training they spent a lot of time together. That is how O’Connor says they became friends.
“A lot of what we talked about was how it was going to be on the street. How it was going to be riding in the black and white. She was seething with anticipation. She couldn’t wait,” O’Connor recalled.
He smilingly recounted how he and other trainees nicknamed Tara “Hiccup” after she would hiccup at the most inappropriate times during their intense training.
“We’re getting screamed at, yelled at, everybody is silent, our tails tucked between our legs and you just hear the hiccups,” joked O’Connor.
He described his friend Tara as tough as nails but with a great sense of humor.
“She was very blunt, she was very unfiltered, so right up my alley. She and I got along really well. She would say what was on her mind. She wouldn’t sugarcoat anything. She was very light-hearted. I remember that she took criticism very well, probably the best that I have seen. She kept her composure well in the face of getting yelled at or screamed at. She just kept her cool,” O’Connor said.
O'Connor was driving home from work last Wednesday when he received the news Tara had been shot. He says he thought everything was going to be fine.
“I had this false sense of knowing she is going to be fine. Not, O’Sullivan, she is going to be fine. And then when it hit it was just like, I should have been there,” said O’Connor.
O’Connor did not complete the police academy but said this tragedy has reinforced his desire to serve and protect.
“We are all extremely heartbroken by the loss, and all I keep telling myself is if she were in the room right now she would be smacking us all upside the head for crying. She was always optimistic and always seeing the bright side of things. She was awesome. If I can take away anything it would be to approach life with a little bit more of that relentless optimism, trying to see the glass half full, even in the worst of circumstances,” O’Connor said.
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