Trooper speaks out on 'divine' traffic stop encounter when he pulled over cop who delivered him in 1991
A young New Jersey State Trooper got the shock of his life when he made a routine traffic stop and realized the retired police officer in the driver's seat had helped deliver him as a baby.
"It was awesome," 26-year old trooper Michael Patterson said of the couldn't-make-this-up moment at a press conference on Thursday.
"You never think a routine stop like that turns into meeting the person who helped give the resources to bring you into the world," Patterson said.
The remarkable reunion happened on Friday when Patterson pulled over driver Matthew Bailly for a minor violation, New Jersey police officials said.
Bailly told the trooper that he was a retired Piscataway police officer, and Patterson responded that he grew up there.
Bailly asked where, so Patterson told him the name of the street where he grew up in the 1990s. Bailly replied that he remembered the street well because he had helped deliver a baby there in 1991 when he was a "rookie cop," police said.
When Bailly gave a detailed description the house and told Patterson that the baby's name was Michael, the young trooper realized who he had pulled over.
"My name is Michael Patterson, sir," he told Bailly. "Thank you for delivering me."
"His mouth dropped -- and so did mine," Patterson told reporters Thursday. "I believe that it was a divine encounter. I met him for a reason."
"We connected at that point," Patterson said at the press conference. "Both of our wives were saying, 'You need to get pictures!' And my mom was saying it as well."
The families met up at Bailly's home - where Bailly and Patterson's mother shared their perspectives from that fateful 1991 day.
Patterson's mother went into labor on October 5, 1991 and her doctor wasn't immediately available, so Bailly responded to the house and the doctor talked him through the delivery by phone.
Patterson said he and the retired cop will definitely stay in touch.
He said he never issued Bailly a ticket.
