Josiah Thomas was born to a family of farmers outside the city of Eilat, Israel. However, he did not experience his country of birth, or the farming life for very long. Just after Josiah’s third birthday, the family moved to San Francisco due to the poor farming conditions they were encountering. His father had settled into a factory job while his mother had stayed a homemaker. Since Hebrew was still spoken in the house, Josiah had the privilege of being bi-lingual.
School had become a breeze for the young Josiah; he picked up on subjects quite easily. In high school he partook in many advanced placement courses, and found he had a knack for chemistry, and history. While in high school he gained popularity by participating in sports and other extra-curricular activities but despite this, he was still felt isolated and harbored a secret.
In 1993, Josiah had graduated high school with honors and had been accepted into a couple of the Ivy League colleges but turned them down in order to live at home to help out with the finances. That fall he had entered into the University of San Francisco, pursuing a criminal justice major. This was with hopes to go to law school. He wanted to help the underdog, people like his parents, and other people he knew who had suffered injustices while living in the U.S.
At college he had opened up, but only slightly. Josiah had met people in passing, but he quickly found college was nothing like high school. The cliques were at a minimum and there seemed to be no struggles for popularity. He had found that he had commonalities with people that he had never would have had with people he went to high school with. Slowly though, he had once again became withdrawn, isolated, and he had seemed to be sick more often than not. But he had put on a front and kept up with school and his part time job.
He knew why this was, and yet he had no one to talk to about it. He had felt isolated and alone, and yet he knew there were resources out there for him … especially on the campus. But he knew he couldn’t expose himself to anyone, it was too risky. Josiah knew his parents were homophobic, and it had nothing to do with religion. They both felt it was unnatural and they never budged on the issue, even though they lived in San Francisco. Despite this knowledge, Josiah still had decided to come out to his parents.
One afternoon, on a rarity the house was empty, right before the Hanukkah season he came out. Suffice it to say it was exactly what he expected. His mother took it hard, and all his father did was look at his son then walk from the room saying nothing. His mother couldn’t even meet his gaze and soon followed her husband out of the room. Josiah just stood there, in the family room. He felt like a million tons had been lifted off of him, but yet he was sad because he knew his parents were upset/hurt/angry over his revelation of being gay. A while later his father had come to his room, told him to pack up his things and to get out of the house. This had surprised Josiah, he knew they would be upset but he had no idea he would be kicked out for it. But being the respectful young man he was, he complied, packed up what he could and left with just a backpack and a couple of duffle bags.
That night he slept in a park, in some brush in order to stay at least somewhat protected. The next day he had talked to the one person he considered his best friend, a girl named Latisha. He had finally come out to her, and then explained what happened. After a quick call to her parents, Josiah had been invited to live with them until he could either find an apartment or get into the dorms. Getting into the dorms had been problematic, so he upped his hours at work, and was able to get a studio apartment just off of campus. It wasn’t the greatest place in the world but it was home and for the first time in 20 years he actually got to have a chance to be on his own.
The rest of his college career was uneventful, he had grown closer to Latisha and she encouraged him to explore his sexuality but he had refused. In fact no one else had known but her and her family. Being gay was a painful reminder of how he lost his own family … he would try to call, write letters, send email but nothing came of it. Even his siblings were not allowed to talk to him, but on rare occasions he would meet one for coffee or lunch but that was far and few between. So he had made a conscious decision to stay celibate, being alone, he felt was a sufficient punishment for making his parents miserable.
Despite a busy work schedule, and a full load of courses, Josiah managed to graduate with honors, and was able to secure a spot at Marquette University Law School. This meant a move to Milwaukee, Wisconsin. After the move, he had settled in and began to like the smaller city … despite its size, it did have a lot to offer and the best part was he got enough financial aid that he was able to get another small studio apartment. He even was able to get a job with the University as a tutor to students who were studying Hebrew. But law school wasn’t what it was cracked up to be; in fact it was down right boring, tedious work. So before his first year of law school had ended he had enrolled and got accepted into Milwaukee’s Police Academy. He had felt he could do more for the community, by being a Police Officer.
He had gone through the Academy with no issues, it took him a while to get used to the idea of using and carrying a gun, but that first time he put on that uniform, he knew being a Police Officer was a perfect fit for him. He was placed with the 12th precinct for the Milwaukee County Police Department. Not much had gone on in the three years that he worked for the 12th precinct, and as much as he loved Milwaukee he loved and missed San Francisco even more. So he put in to transfer to San Francisco’s Police Department.
After the three-week transfer training course, Josiah had been assigned to the 8th precinct, which had included a bit of the Castro District. It had quickly reminded him of the part of his life he shut out. All he ever did was work, go to the gym, go to movies, and when he had the time go to comic book conventions. He never made time to date someone, which is an excuse he had told himself. Truth was, he was scared to let that part of himself out.
This time he was assigned with a female partner, her name, Carolyn Macarthur. Early on she could see the turmoil that her partner was going through, she also would catch a glimpse of Josiah checking out some random shirtless guy. So after some convincing, a lot of convincing, she managed to set Josiah up with her brother. Josiah was nervous; this was his first date with a man.
He had gone on a date with Grady and it was a complete disaster, but Grady had called and asked for another date. Josiah had reluctantly accepted, he wasn’t sure if he could handle another disaster. But this time the date had gone much better and Josiah had found himself laughing and having a good time, and that night he shared his first kiss with a man. Over time he and Grady had become closer and were dating. Things had gone sour when it came time for intimacy. Guilt had consumed him due to residual feelings concerning his family. Despite the understanding, Grady wanted to move to the next step with Josiah but had to break up with the police officer.
For about a month Josiah had gone through a funk even though no one at the 8th precinct would have ever guessed why. It was after this point he had decided that dating would never be for him, that he would never ever be comfortable doing it. However, now that he was edging toward 30 he was starting to feel the pangs of wanting companionship, so he went to the local pound and adopted a puppy beagle that he named Oliver.
Oliver had been a breath of fresh air for the police officer; because of Oliver, Josiah had decided to work with the K9 division. After 3 months of training, the canine he was assigned with could begin their work together. This had been a different type of patrol work, and he found himself drawing his gun far more then he had before in his career. On September 2nd, 2005 Josiah had almost been killed in the line of duty. During a routine drug bust, things had gone terribly wrong and he and four other officers had miscalculated how many were in the basement meth lab. Shots were fired; two officers and two dogs were killed. Josiah was shot three times, once in the shoulder, the abdomen, and the left leg. Back up had arrived and more of a shootout had ensued. To this day Josiah has no memory of the incident. During his recovery his parents, and majority of his siblings made no attempt to contact or see him. Only Latisha had been by almost everyday to see him. After 5 surgeries, and four months of recovery, he was welcome back to the 8th precinct but on desk duty.
Four months of desk duty was a bore, but it gave him a lot of time to think and a lot more time to partake in physical therapy and working out. He was determined to get strong again; he was determined to prove that he could go back on patrol. However, there was no way he could go back to being on the K9 team anymore. The thoughts of his former partner (one of the dogs killed) crept up into his head almost everyday. He loved animals, and he wasn’t sure if he could put another one in jeopardy. So for four months he typed away, filed, took complaints, and got stronger with each passing day.
Even though he had passed the physical to go back on patrol duty, the 8th precinct’s Captain was not so keen to let Josiah back out on the streets. This was not acceptable, and despite how much he liked being with the 8th precinct, he put in for a transfer that would allow him to do patrol once again. The transfer put him at the 4th precinct. The precinct was nothing like his former precinct, most of the men were macho homophobes, and very few women had worked there due to the sexual harassment rumors that floated around. Josiah tried extra hard to hide his secret, but never took part in the banter that his colleagues did concerning women.
Josiah decided that he could not take this type of work environment anymore, he couldn’t talk about anything with these men … nor did he have anything in common with them. So instead of transferring he decided it was time to take his career to the next level. So after some contemplation, he decided to take the city’s inspector exam. He studied and passed the exam with no issue; however from the time he had taken the exam and gotten the results all spots had been filled.
One day, not long after receiving his results from the first exam, he had caught the bulletin board at another precinct he was at. Sierra Falls was in need of inspectors; he called and set up a time to take the test. On the day of the test he drove down to Sierra Falls’ main headquarters. He was quite impressed with the city, he had never been there in all the years he had lived in California and he was sorry that he hadn’t.
Two weeks later he got confirmation that he had passed the test and was offered a position, which he took. He finished up his work at the 4th precinct and made a hasty move to Sierra Falls. He was excited to start the new job, and was even more excited to get a fresh start. Josiah took the transfer training course without incident and was able to join Sierra Falls detective force on January 21st, 2008
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