Birmingham, Alabama — When those blue lights appeared in her car’s rearview mirror about two years ago, then-20-year-old Abbie Rutledge knew she’d done something wrong, in the wrong place at the wrong time. But everything changed after she talked to the officer who pulled her over.
“I think it was the right person, the right time and the right words said,” Rutledge said.
She told JT Brown, the Alabama police officer who pulled her over for speeding in August 2022, that she couldn’t afford to pay a ticket. She was broke and had a dead-end job.
“And I said, ‘Well, what if we talk about it then?'” Brown told CBS News.
Rutledge said their conversation “lasted about” 10 to 15 minutes, “just talking about different career paths.”
They concluded that Rutledge would make an excellent nurse, so Brown let her go with only a warning.. And on it he wrote, “Promise me you’ll go to nursing school, slow down, and I won’t give you a ticket.”
However, Brown said he “never” imagined she would take it so seriously.
“As soon as he left and as soon as I got to where I wanted to go, I started moving toward this career,” Rutledge said. “And now I’m here.”
Rutledge graduated last month from the two-year surgical technology program at Bevill State Community College in Jasper, Alabama.
She now works as a surgical technician at the University of Alabama Hospital in Birmingham. She says she loves her new job and gives full credit to Brown, who attended her graduation.
“I wanted him to see the impression he made on me,” Rutledge said. “Five minutes of talking to someone, even if you don’t know them, can have the biggest impact on their life, ever… You never know when it might happen.”
Brown went above and beyond what he asked for in order to obtain a license and registration when he advised and motivated Rutledge. By following the advice written on this warning, Rutledge not only helped herself, but she also did him the exact same favor.
“She made my whole career worthwhile,” Brown said.
Steve Hartman
