For Las Vegas Valley businessman, cleaning up mess is full-time job

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If you’re squeamish, stop reading now.

John Gardner is about to regale you with some of the cases he’s come across in his career as a policeman and crime-scene cleaner.

Gardner’s work life hasn’t been without its detours. After several years as a policeman in Nebraska in the 1970s, low pay encouraged him to leave law enforcement and launch an excavation business. He also worked for a mortuary, and after he and his wife, Joyce, moved to Las Vegas in 2000, the couple started a landscaping company.

In October, the couple bought Absolute Decon Services, which cleans up after car wrecks, crimes, industrial accidents, natural deaths and even burglaries and break-ins.

Question: Talk about your decision as a couple to buy this business. Why crime-scene cleanup?

Answer: I didn’t want to be out there running the lawn mower or digging holes anymore. (Joyce) and I discussed how the job had taken a toll on my body, so we decided to find something we both know about. This business came up for sale, and we bought it a month later.

We talked about starting a business, but it’s always better if you buy an ongoing business. The business is already established. This business has a contract with the county to do biohazard cleanups in police cruisers, and we do accident scenes for the county. We weren’t starting from ground zero.

Question: What are the drawbacks to buying an existing business?

Answer: The customers you have don’t have to stay with you. October to February was a real struggle. We debated whether we made the right choice. The last couple of months it’s picked up because we have spent a lot of money on advertising. We’ve got a Web site and we advertise in telephone books.

Question: What kept you going in the first four months when business wasn’t so great?

Answer: Perseverance, and my pride of not letting it lead me under. It was a struggle.

Question: Before you bought Absolute Decon, what other types of businesses did you consider?

Answer: We looked at a mobile-detailing car wash, but there were so many people in that industry, and there was such variation in the prices people charged. The one we looked into the most was mobile billboards.

But that business versus this business would have required three times the money, and I’d have needed a lot more help (from employees).

Question: You mentioned you were looking for something you both knew about. How would you say you knew about accident and crime-scene cleanup?

Answer: Joyce is a nurse, and I was police officer, and we both have been on rescue squads.

For two years, I also worked for a mortuary. I learned how to smooth it over with people when they’re crying or disturbed. When you’re in a home or at a death on the street, everybody wants to know what happened. You need to know what you can say and what you can’t say.

Question: So what kinds of things do you find in police cars?

Answer: You find blood, urine, feces, spit. Sometimes, (arrested people) get angry and start beating their head against the cruiser and cut themselves. Sometimes, they’ve been in a fight, so there’s blood running out of them or they spit blood. You also clean scabies, lice and fleas because officers pick up the ladies of the night, and some of those ladies are pretty well liced and flead. These officers, when they find that out, they get out of those cruisers in a hurry.

Question: What’s the worst or most shocking thing you’ve seen in the eight months you’ve owned the business?

Answer: We cleaned an apartment unit. Let’s just say the tenant was overweight. He said he was incapable of getting out of his wheelchair, and he defecated on himself and all over his apartment for about three months. He had backed his toilet up and flooded his apartment, and he was riding around in it.

There was poop on the walls, the ceilings, everywhere. I got about 30 feet from the apartment and I said, "This can’t be what I’m smelling." We walk up to the apartment and open the door, and sitting there was this big guy, about 750 pounds, covered in poop from the waist down.

Question: So what was the process of cleaning that?

Answer: It took me 40 man hours. I brought a couple of other people in. It was the first job they went on with me, and definitely the last.

Question: How do you keep this job from depressing you or making you sad?

Answer: I look at it from the point that I’m helping people. My main goal is to just not let them be depressed over the whole situation. I want not only to do my job and do it the best I can, but also to convey my condolences to the people involved. I don’t look at it as a depressing scene. I look at it as a job to be done.

Question: Do you ever lose faith in people?

Answer: Sometimes I do, yes. People sometimes are very inconsiderate of their own family members. Families can be very inconsiderate of each other in a time of crisis. You see it all the time.

Whenever someone dies, everybody splits and there’s an argument somewhere. Nobody wants to take the blame for not taking care of dad or mom or whatever the situation is.

Question: Have you ever lost your composure, maybe cried or thrown up, as a policeman or crime-scene cleaner?

Answer: I’ve thrown up on the job only one time in my life. I was giving cardiopulmonary resuscitation to a lady and she ended up vomiting. That there did make me lose my lunch. The officer next to me lost his lunch before I lost mine. And it was all to no avail because she didn’t make it.

It became a running joke. Everybody would say, "You ate her lunch with her and you still couldn’t save her."

Question: What is rewarding about your work?

Answer: The good side of it is knowing you’re helping people. I’m here to help with whatever I can do. You’ve always got to console somebody, so the consoling of the family member is the most rewarding. You walk out of that situation and they’re no longer really bawling their eyes out.

I always tell people they’ve got to look at it from the point of view of the person passing away. He or she would want you to feel sadness but not despair.

Question: Since you bought the business, some new competitors have started up. How will you compete in this industry?

Answer: We will stay at a fair and adjustable price, and we know our work will be 100 percent done right. The public needs to be aware of who can clean up the biohazards. Not everybody is licensed so the unlicensed people are putting it where it shouldn’t be — in Dumpsters or down storm sewers. People hire them because of the cheap price, but you need to ask somebody for their license, and you need to ask them if they’re bonded or insured.