the case stand in the middle of the sleeping residential neighborhood, debriefing under the fluorescent glow of streetlights. Sergeant Brad Burt praises the tactics they chose for a man who was clearly just plain out of it. Surely he would have sustained physical injury from the stun bags, a Taser or the police dog.

"I'm glad we handled it the way we did," he tells the collection of officers. "I wouldn't have slept well if we'd dogged him."

By now it's close to midnight, but Ragsdale stays behind to check one more time on the mom, and to make sure the man is put in the psych ward, not the general jail population.

The next day, some of the same SAU officers are on the scene of another barricade involving anotherof him. He does not resist, does not even register their presence. The medics wheel him out on a stretcher.

Getting on the Special Assignments Unit is tough, but Jeff Green says leaving is even harder.

"This is the elite of the department, it really is," he says. "Every officer on the department, regardless of their ability, would like to be on SAU.

"We do all the cool stuff."

Today is Green's last day in SAU. After four years on the unit, he has been promoted to sergeant, and all new sergeants must spend time in "the field," as patrol is called.

The guys have just given him a little send-off, a roast of sorts, plus speeches from his sergeant, the lieutenant and the commander.

"This is a team thing," Green explains. "I know