In college, so late 1980s, as my then-girlfriend and I were walking into the mall one day, we saw the doors to the anchor store in front of us burst open and a pudgy guy with his arms absolutely full of womens’ bathing suits sprint toward the parking lot. When I say absolutely full, I mean he looked like he had walked up to one of those circular clothes racks, spread his arms as wide as he could, grabbed everything that fit, and ran.
If I’d started running when I first thought of it, I could have caught him and brought him down like a lion bringing down a wildebeest, but I didn’t; anyway, my girlfriend told me later that she’d have been furious if I had tried. Still, I regret not having quicker reflexes.
ETA: I did not see, but I heard a crime committed on my college campus. After fall-term exams in 1986, someone executed via shotgun one (maybe two) of the swans that populated the lake on campus. I heard the shots as I was watching Cagney and Lacey.
A few years ago I was on vacation with my then-GF. We were staying at a pretty nice hotel, but we had a kind of low-rent room. We were taking a nap late in the afternoon when I was awoken to the sweet gentle strains of domestic violence next door. Just about the time I was sure of what was going on, GF told me to call 911.
By the time the police arrived, the guy next door had left. The dispatcher told me to stay on the line. A cop knocked on our door, and asked me to step outside. “Sir, stay on the line.” “Sir, hang up and step outside.” It was a little disturbing, knowing that whatever I did, someone was not going to like it. GF finally got through to the cop that I was not beating her, it was the couple next door.
Apparently the woman was not a mere victim in the beating. She was wanted for a number of offenses and they arrested her. And the cops knew who the guy was and where he was staying.
GF, cops, and I walked up to the office to talk to the hotel manager. GF mentioned that she didn’t feel safe staying there anymore and would rather go home that night than stay in that room. The hotel manager appeased us by putting us in the best room they had – the one with the hot tub.
I witnessed a domestic assault too. I was in college, but home on a break. I was stopped at a red light in the wee hours of the morning and saw a Jeep Cherokee whip into a church parking lot, practically sideways, which was odd and caught my attnetion.
A woman got out of the Jeep and started to run, but the man got out just as quick and grabbed her and started hitting her. I pulled into a gas station and called 911. I stayed on the line and relayed every blow. At one point, the guy got back in the Jeep and almost ran her over. Thankfully, it’s a small town, so the cops got there pretty quick - 4 police cars showed up, lights and sirens blazing. As soon as the cops pulled in, the lady (thankfully) RAN to them. I hung up with 911 and went home.
Looking back, I sometimes think maybe I should have pulled in the parking lot and had the lady get in my car. OTOH, I was 19 and just didn’t know what else to do but call the police.
You did the right thing. Sometimes when you intervene the victim will support the abuser and then you’ve got both of them after you. Don’t ignore it but unless you’re in a position to handle both of them don’t step into the middle.
I walked into an armed robbery once at the local Blockbuster, completely oblivious. Got held at gunpoint for a few minutes - could have been a hell of a lot worse, startling them like that.
I’v seen a lot of crazy shit in Mexico. But on this side of the river?
I once inadvertently found myself in the same room as a “Go to jail forever” amount of drugs.
A roommate of mine brought home a 13 year-old runaway as his new girlfriend. I moved the fuck out.
I was there at the end of this, where a kidnapper, rapist, murderer, carjacker, SHITHEAD drove a stolen suv all the way through (really, corner to corner) a Wal*Mart before blowing his brains out.
…and then there’s the time I punched a cop in the balls. Don’t ask.
This reminds me of the most bizarre domestic abuse incident I have ever witnessed.
I must’ve been in my late teens. My best friend and I had gone to a movie, and afterwards we went to a pizza parlor. There weren’t a lot of customers, but we weren’t alone.
This couple came in. I don’t think they said more than two words to each other the whole time they were there. The place had tables and benches, and the woman sat down at one. The guy placed their order. While they waited for it, the guy was getting more and more antsy, pacing around, trying to see over the high counter into the pizza kitchen.
And every time he passed by where the woman was sitting, he’d reach over and slap her in the face. The woman just sat there like nothing was happening.
He didn’t hit her with everything he had. It was sort of like a swat. But it wasn’t like he was playing with her. He was pissed off.
Today, I most definitely would’ve called the police. But back then, my friend and I weren’t sure what to think or do. We just tried to watch without looking like we were watching, if you know what I mean.
Nobody else did anything either. The couple got their order and left.
The guy absolutely had some kind of mental problem. To this day, I can’t imagine what the mindset of the woman was.
I just remember being thoroughly creeped out, and I’m ashamed to say it, my friend and I did nothing but joke about it afterwards.
I remember an old man who when he got older, couldn’t stop hitting people at random. Not too hard, but his impulse control just seems to be on the blink.
I worked in a convenience/deli/liquor store for a while. We had hard liquor for sale, and that stuff seems to grow legs and walk out of the store on its own. We had a lot of other stuff shoplifted, too. I don’t know how many kids I caught stealing. It was harder to catch the adults, but I caught a lot of them stealing stuff, too.
A lot of the adults wanted me to just give them stuff out of the deli case, or to write down a much lower price.
We knew that some people stole because we’d have merchandise on display before they entered the store, and it was gone after they left, we just couldn’t catch them at it. One family was particularly well known for taking stuff…mom and her four or five kids would come in and manage to walk out with a LOT of merchandise. Personally, I would have banned them from the store completely, but the owner didn’t want to do that. Mom was always griping about the high prices (hello, you and your spawn are part of the reason there) and her kids were always stealing cigarettes, beer, and trying to play the slots (it was Las Vegas, every place had slots).
I remember one kid (not one of that family) who was a known thief, but who was pleasant and charming. One day she came up to me and asked why we no longer carried a particular kind of candy. I told her that it was because we never sold any, it always got stolen, so the store couldn’t afford to carry it any longer. I knew that she stole this particular kind of candy, and she seemed taken aback at the notion that the store couldn’t afford to get stolen from. I think that I was responsible for her changing her ways. I hope so.
I was a passenger in a friend’s car. In the trunk of the car, and he showed me this, was a nearly complete skeleton that he and a couple of other guys had obtained through an honest to God grave robbery a couple of days before. It was a very old grave and the fact that it had been dug up made a lot of headlines in Dallas at the time. They guy was caught dumping it a couple of days later; I wasn’t involved in the crime but I didn’t report it either. I never understood the point except we were teenagers and the perpetrators were drunk at the time.
I’ve seen a lot of illegal street racing; drag racing, that is. I’ve seen stolen cars used in those races and I watched/helped some of the cars get stolen.
I was with a guy when he broke into a music store and stole several guitars. I was with the same guy on a stolen gun thing; that one scared hell out of me. I was the lookout guy both times.
I’ve seen a lot of underage guys buy alcohol at a particular store known for selling to kids.
I’ve been involved in several genuine gang fights that involved illegal weapons.
I work in health care. We’re not going to open THAT can of worms.
It’s been my fate to witness ‘five fingered discounts’ on about a monthly basis.
The biggest item shoplifted a few feet from me, was a portable TV in a department store. The guy just picked it up and carried it off.
Another time, a guy cached 3 or 4 tobacco tins under his jacket and hustled out of the store. I did give the manager a description, but the perp was long gone.
Last week, I watched a woman secret about 20 chocolate bars in her purse. Maybe more: she just scooped them up by the handful, several times, and dumped them in her bag. Then she did some small shopping (it was a dollar store), paid up at the cash register, and left.
This one was a professional petty thief. I mean, she was smooth!
What did I do? Nothing. My word against hers, and I’ve been caught in the ‘he said/she said’ razzamataz in the past.
The most violent crime I’ve ever witnessed was when we took my parents out for dinner in a very nice place in a city nearby. As we were leaving the parking ramp, just as we made the last turn to the booth, we heard a shot and the car in front of us sped away.
We pulled up to the toll booth and all we could see was the contents of the clerk’s cranium on the wall.
Fun huh?
I was a a friends house, sitting there minding my own business, when The Dude stops over. He ( as I later found out) has to dis-assemble the interior of his car to get the stash out.
I see what’s going on and wonder if it is too late to get the fuck out.
No cops, no problems, but I will not forget the feeling.
1981, on lunch from school in Minneapolis. Three of us in the car and I’m driving down Lake Street like a bat out of hell, about 50 mph in a 30 zone, when the guy in the back seat says “Um, you might want to slow down”. I ask why. “Because I have 5,000 hits of speed in my briefcase.”
I was robbed twice back in my hitch-hiking days. I’m sure they were dissapointed.
I haven’t witnessed any crimes except for auto accidents, only two of which required further input from me. (One of those was when the guy who hit the bicyclist called about a year later and asked if I knew the guy riding the bike. Apparently he’d pled guilty to whatever misdemeanor it was, and he had to make restitution for a couple hundred dollars of medical bills, but neither he nor the court could find the victim. I couldn’t help, and I’ve always wondered how that worked out.)
The punk band MDC played in a small town near to my hometown once. After the show, the band was going to spend the night at my friend’s house, back in our hometown. I was lucky and got a ride home with the band (and my friend) in the band’s van.
For those of you that don’t know, the initials MDC stood for any cause the band wanted to champion at the time. On some albums they were “Millions of Damn Christians”, on another they were “Multi-Death Corporations”. For this particular tour, they were “Millions of Dead Cops” and they had four or five boxes of T-shirts in the van with this slogan printed on them. At the time my friend was also dealing acid, and had a few sheets with him as well.
This particular gig was on a Labour Day weekend and the police were on the local highways doing random breathalyzer stops. The van we were in was stopped. My friend and I were in the back, cowering behind the boxes with the “Millions of Dead Cops” T-shirts, hoping and praying the police wouldn’t search the van. (Actually, my friend was doing most of the hoping and praying. (I was clean, but I was doing some hoping and praying for his sake, and the band’s sake as well.))
We were waved on, the van wasn’t searched, and the punks got away to gig another day.
Yeah, this. A friend of mine (back when he was a cop) went to a domestic call in a his shitty city and this dude was beating his wife with a baseball bat. While he choked the dude out with his baton, the “victim” stabbed my friend right in his collarbone. 20 years later, she’s still in prison. In a wheelchair from a bullet or two hitting her in the spine.
The most extreme one I witnessed was a gang of young men attacking a kebab shop owner with a samurai sword. I called the police and kept an eye out from a safe place until a police van and ambulance showed up. I’ve no idea how badly injured the kebab shop worker was - they were open again within a few hours.
When it went to court I refused to testify unless my identity was concealed; I was too far away to ID anybody anyway and all they wanted me to do was say I was scared so that they could get them on some sort of public order offence, but fuck if I’m going to be the one standing there in court saying my name and address and lying about being scared in order to try and send someone to jail, and no doubt failing.
There were threats made that I’d be the one sent to jail if I didn’t testify, but I continued to refuse and they eventually gave up.
One time also I was sitting in my kitchen and heard what sounded like a gunshot. Looked out the window, and instead of the expected firework or backfiring car there was a man with a gun running down the street followed by about a dozen people of all different colours and ages. Lots more people came running out carrying baseball bats (with one woman trying to hold a teenage boy back, crying 'no, Aaron, no, he’s not worth it!)
Eventually the police arrived (I’d called them but refused to give my name) and everyone scattered. I advised my GF not to walk down the back alley leading to that street as she came home.
The rest are ordinary drugs, assaults, indecent exposure, arson, etc, and one hit and run. One time I intervened to stop some kids stoning an old man (I was 16 myself) and ended up being beaten up myself, but I’d say I was a little more resilient than the old man, who got away safely.
I didn’t witness the actual thieving, but I once saw two LP guys chase down a shoplifter at the Kohls I was shopping at. The guy ended up dropping some stuff, but he got away. The LP officers came back sweating and panting, and I heard one mutter “I’m getting too old for this stuff.”
