Character Interview: Joe Krueger

1) Do you have a dog? Go to the dog park? Allow your pet to sleep in your bed?

As an investigator in the Narcotics Division of the Detective Bureau of the NYPD, I work long hours. There are times I am stuck in the bullpen in Police HQ way past midnight, and sometimes during weekends too. That means I’m not able to keep a dog. If I did, they just wouldn’t get the attention they needed.

2) Are you married? In a serious relationship? Leaving your options open?

Back in my twenties I got married, right after I returned from Iraq. But my work took it’s toll on that relationship. I guess I spent too many holidays working cases. That’s why my wife recently split and moved in with a stockbroker boyfriend. I try not to be bitter, but I sure am disappointed, mostly in myself.

3) Do you own a house? Move around? Crash on couches?

I am renting an apartment in Murray Hill. But I’m rarely there. More than once, in fact, I’ve slept in my office.

4) What's your biggest secret? What's the biggest secret you've kept for others?

It’s a secret that I’ve not only kept hidden from others; it’s one I’ve tried hard to forget myself. My late grandfather was German, and served the Third Reich during the war. General Wolfgang Krueger fought in North Africa and led Nazi forces during the Battle of the Bulge. After the war, he sent his wife and daughter (my mother) to America, before being imprisoned at Spandau Prison in Berlin. He died there in the early 1950s.

5) Who's your best friend? How did you meet? Memory that makes you laugh?

My job leaves little time for socializing, but I am fond of my partner, Sam O’Brian. He’s the biggest guy on the force, and a former boxer. But it’s not his size that makes his presence reassuring when you are on a stake-out, it’s his smarts. There’s no other guy I want in my corner when I’m fighting crooks.