Six-year-old Moses Thompson had a big grin after being deputized by Pima County Sheriff Clarence Dupnik on Tuesday at the department’s headquarters.
The Marana boy, who has an inoperable tumor and an undiagnosed illness, was befriended by Deputy Michael Walsh and his fellow members of the Pima Regional SWAT team nearly two years ago.
Walsh met Moses after he learned about the boy through his sister. Walsh’s niece was a kindergarten classmate of Moses’, who is now a first-grader at Estes Elementary School.
Members of the multiagency Special Weapons and Tactics team adopted Moses as their mascot, and they invited him Tuesday to take part in training at the Pima Regional Training Center, 10001 S. Rita Road.
Before Moses reported for duty, he was taken to Tucson International Airport, where he got to see a U.S. Customs and Border Protection Black Hawk helicopter close up.
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“It was cool,” said Moses, explaining that the chopper flew over his head and he felt the wind blowing him back. “It was close,” Moses shrieked.
The “cool” magnified when Moses, dressed in a SWAT uniform, arrived at the training center in a Sheriff’s Department vehicle with sirens blaring.
He immediately burst into action and with the help of team members ran an obstacle course, including showing his strength and endurance at 25 obstacles.
Moses scaled tower structures, climbed out a window onto the roof of a two-story building, received help pulling a 165-pound dummy, walked a balance beam and made his way through 10-feet-long concrete tubes.
“You made the team, buddy,” fellow SWAT members yelled at Moses as he finished running to the finish line.
“He ran the course in under eight minutes,” said Sgt. Zach Pierce of the Oro Valley Police Department. “He passed,” added Pierce, grinning.
After the obstacle course, Moses saw Joran, a Belgian Malinois dog, in action attacking a “bad guy” played by Marana police Officer Chriswell Scott. Scott wore protective gear, and Joran followed the commands of his partner, sheriff’s Deputy Paul Petropoulos, who spoke in Dutch.
In addition to taking a photo with his SWAT team members, Moses took part in checking a building for suspects and making an arrest with handcuffs.
“It all feels good. My favorite was the obstacle course,” Moses said as his mother, Tabitha Thompson, 27, looked at her son with joy.
“It is a great day for him,” said Thompson, adding that her son was accepted by the National Institutes of Health for a program in which medical experts will work on diagnosing his illness.
“The institute accepts 50 to 100 patients a year, and I am so glad Moses made it,” Thompson said. “My son was fine, and when he was 4, it all started with a swollen ankle, and then swollen lymph nodes,” she said. An inoperable mass grew in the lining of Moses’ small intestine, and it wrapped around blood vessels that feed the small intestine, Thompson said.
“There are some days he does not get out of bed, and there are others when he can run a marathon. But through the pain there is still a smile on his face.”
