Q: How soon after your injury did you focus on getting back to your old job?
A: While the truck was still on top of my leg. Before they put tourniquets on me.
That’s how our interview with Denver police sergeant Justin Dodge began. The “old job” we asked about is SWAT team leader, a position Dodge held for nearly two decades before the firetruck ended up on top of his leg. And that happened on June 15, 2023, during a relatively safe assignment: providing crowd security during the downtown victory parade for Denver’s newly crowned NBA champs, the Nuggets.
As Dodge was walking alongside the truck bearing the Nuggets’ two biggest stars, Nikola Jokic and Jamaal Murray, the 20-ton vehicle rolled over his left heel and pulled his leg underneath. Incredibly, first responders managed to get Dodge free with his limb still attached, sort of. He wouldn’t undergo amputation for another three weeks, after several surgical attempts to salvage the leg.
From the get-go, Dodge made it clear to every person on his medical care team that his overriding priority was to return to the profession he loves and excels at. Seven months later, he was back at work in a partial capacity. He was cleared for unrestricted SWAT team service around May 1—less then 11 months after the accident.
We met Dodge in late April, just before he returned to the field, and we had an extended conversation with him last month. Because Disability Employment Awareness Month and National Physical Therapy Month both kick off this week, it seems like the perfect time to share how Dodge preserved his career while adapting to limb loss. It hasn’t been easy, and it has required both a deep personal commitment and a dedicated support team. But Dodge has never backed down from armed fugitives, bomb scares, hostage situations, or other obstacles. He wasn’t about to let limb loss or any other injury keep him from doing his duty.
On the contrary, Dodge is using his experience to help others keep working toward their objectives in the face of monumental challenges. He’s started making speaking appearances for organizations of all kinds. Learn more at Dodge’s website, heavyvictory.com.
Our conversation is edited for length and readability.
What precedent was there for someone returning to an active duty SWAT team after limb loss? Was there a playbook, or did you guys have to invent that?
We made it up as we went. Our tactical unit has a very stringent physical fitness test, very difficult firearms qualifications, those types of things. Obviously I wanted to go back, but I also didn’t want to be a token. I didn’t want them letting me come back to just sit in an armored vehicle. I was either going to be fully operational, or I wasn’t coming back. And to be fully operational, I had to pass the fitness tests and meet the rifle and handgun standards. So that’s what we focused on: Can you pass these tests?
And you are the first amputee nationwide to regain active duty status in this type of tactical unit, is that accurate?
The National Tactical Officers Association, which is the national governing body for tactical units, is not aware of any other full-time Tier One tactical member in the nation that is serving as an amputee. There may be one out there, but the governing body is not aware of any.
What is it about this job that’s so motivating for you?
I’m an incredibly driven individual. I want to be the best at what I do, and the top echelon in the law enforcement world, on a domestic side, is to be part of a Tier One Tactical Unit. There’s no higher assignment you can get to. It puts you in a position to save lives and to solve the most dangerous, intricate situations a community can face. That’s what I want to do.
As long as something fulfills my purpose, I want to be the best. When I had kids, I wanted to be the best dad on the planet. Now that I’ve gotten injured, I spend countless hours speaking, doing interviews, and talking on the phone with random people who I meet through emails or through networking who are going through something like I went through. It’s now my purpose and my drive to help people get back to some status of life that is high quality for them.
When you told your doctors, your prosthetist, your physical therapist, et cetera, that you wanted to get back to active duty, what kind of response did you get? Did anybody push back and say, “Whoa, hold on, let’s get real here”? Or was everybody on board?
Right from while I was in the emergency room, the surgeon told me, “You’re going to be there.” There’s never been a single person in the healthcare profession that has told me it isn’t achievable. They have instructed me to be patient, which is something that’s difficult for me, and to understand the healing process and understand the rehabilitation process.
What did that program look like? You mentioned the need to clear these job-specific hurdles regarding fitness and marksmanship. Was your rehab program tailored to that specific set of tests?
There’s two answers to that. They were ordering weights and bands to the hospital, because I knew I needed to work out after every surgery. In between all eight surgeries, I was back in a gym. I might be in a wheelchair with a wound vac tube sticking out, but I was in a gym. The overall theme was that I would not let a day that go by that I wasn’t doing something to get me closer to achieving expectations. There were days where that was just to pack my leg in ice and try to stay off pain meds. It included making sure I was hydrated enough, making sure I was eating the correct foods, all of those types of things. And then as I progressed, it was: How fast can I bike four miles on an assault bike with one leg? How many pistol squats can I do on one leg?
It took me almost seven months to get fitted for a prosthesis, because of the damage that was done to the soft tissue. But mentally, I was starting my rehab while the truck was still on top of me. And physically, my rehab was going forward from day one. Had I waited to start my rehab until I got my leg, I never would have been in the position that I’m in right now.
After that, I had to be very intelligent. I had a wear schedule, because I’d get pressure sores. I’d get blisters. So we had to work within all of those confines. But that was when we really started dialing into the overall development of performance to get me back to a point where I could pass the fitness test. You have to be in phenomenal shape in a lot of different areas in order to pass this test. But I knew if I could pass, it meant I was truly back in the top 5 percent of the population in terms of fitness. I did not want to be operational until I had taken the test. That was very, very important to me.
Was it important because you needed to know you had earned it 100 percent—that you weren’t just a token? Or was that something that you felt the rest of the force needed to see?
I’d already passed the test in nonofficial capacities multiple times. There was no question in my mind I was completely capable of doing the job. So the actual function of taking the test was to check a box for my teammates, for the agency, for the members of the department, and for the community that, yep, he’s good to go. He passed all the tests.
Were there any parts of the rehab that posed a particular challenge or required you to adjust your program?
The biggest thing is that I didn’t have a clean injury. To this day I have two significant open wounds on my legs. I’m not allowed to be in a pool or a hot tub or a bathtub or the ocean. Those wounds are still continuing to heal, continuing to get better, but there is this constant mental grind of knowing that my leg is not completely healed yet, and we have to work around that. The custom liners are incredible, but there would still be days when I was just crushing it (in rehab), and all of a sudden we’d find a blister, and I’m back in a wheelchair for a couple of days. Those ups and downs were mentally devastating to me. But I told myself: “You can either get off the leg for the next three to four days, maybe even a week, and let this thing heal, let it callous, and get back in the fight; or you can push through it and potentially make it worse, so we’re talking about surgical revisions or even, worst case, an above the knee revision or something like that.” I’m actually still dealing with those major ups and downs to this day.
And then it’s just painful wearing a prosthetic, especially doing the high-level activity that I’m doing. It hurts all the time. There is never a moment in my life, while my leg is on or off, that I’m not in pain. When I’m working out or when I’m operational, my mind just kind of blocks that pain, so it doesn’t affect me when I’m at work or when I’m in the gym. But sitting at my kid’s football game, especially after doing a couple of ops (at work), I’ll literally lay in the stands with my leg off. I’ll explain to people that wearing a prosthetic is like wearing the tightest, stiffest pair of boots you’ve ever had in your life. And they don’t break in.
Describe a couple of ops for me. What are the types of situations you guys are called in to untangle?
We do all of the high-risk weapon-related, or potentially weapon-related, search warrants in the city. We do all the high-risk fugitive apprehensions in the city. We do all of the barricaded gunmen in the city. And we are a hostage-rescue team, so God forbid you would have a hostage situation, it’s our job to come in and try to keep people from dying. In the short time I’ve been back, we’ve actually executed a hostage rescue where I was part of the entry team on my prosthetic.
Has there ever been a point since you’ve returned to the field that the prosthesis hasn’t performed and you had to go back and work with your practitioner to make adjustments?
I actually have two legs, and they’re phenomenal legs to begin with. As I’ve gotten stronger and faster and gained the ability to move more, we’ve made some little tweaks. But I can honestly tell you that when I’m operational, I have no idea that I’m in a prosthetic, as far as my ability to move and be part of the team. I have yet to come across something where I think, “I can’t do this.” But I’m in my prothetist’s office probably every couple of weeks to make little adjustments, maybe a 16th of an inch turn on one particular component, something like that. So it’s an ongoing process. And as technology continues to improve, I always want to be on the best feet, because my job requires me to be incredibly active.
When you talk with other people now who are battling back from an injury, what are the two or three things that you think are paramount for them to focus on?
You have to put in daily work. Hoping and wishing is not a plan, and it’s certainly not action. Every single day, you have to wake up with a plan. You have to execute that plan, evaluate it at the end of the night, and do it again and again and again. We have a phrase in the tactical world that you can’t eat an elephant in one bite. When you try to do that, a lot of times it will set you back mentally, which can set you back physically. So instead, do obtainable daily tasks, do them consistently, and measure your performance and your recovery every couple of weeks. Just by being steady, eating correctly, drinking plenty of water, and being in the gym, I was able to make a huge amount of progress before I even got my leg.
You start doing small things, and it’s a snowball effect. Sometimes I’ll be kind of harsh with people. I’ll ask them: “What are you doing to move forward?” Sometimes the answer is, “I’m waiting to get started, because I can’t do this yet or I can’t do that.” But there are always things they can be doing.
Why do you think people delay or opt out?
I think it’s a couple of things. One is that it’s difficult to put in work every single day. And when you add in a traumatic event, it’s very easy for people to just get completely overwhelmed. So I think a lot of times it’s the difficulty that you actually have to do this every single day, no matter how bad you might feel.
I would be completely lying if I said I didn’t have nights where I was in tears for two hours. I go from performing hostage rescues into realizing I’m permanently disabled, and of course there are ups and downs. It’s expected that you’re going to have those ups and downs. But you still have to keep moving forward during the downs.
You’re now in a role where you can be a resource for people who are dealing with a life-changing injury. Were there any people who you found incredibly helpful as you were first learning about this process?
I’m very fortunate because I work for a Tier One tacs unit, and we work hand-in-hand with the highest levels of the military. So within days of my injury, I had 20 guys in touch with me who had lost limbs and gone back to full deployment status. I did not do this alone. Because of the job I have, I had access to a massive support system. I know a lot of people don’t have that, so they have to go find it. You might have to put in a little bit of work to find people or talk to your prosthetist to get connected.
I’ve had people tell me, “I could never be like you. I could never perform like you.” And that’s not accurate. I promise you, if you go through a process that keeps you moving forward, eventually you’re going to get better. You’re going to become a better version of yourself mentally, physically, and spiritually. Today is your day to get started.