I was thinking the whole time I was in that holding tank, I could be having a number of strong drinks with a woman named Rachel, instead of being perused by the detectives of the Homicide Devision as to my being a murderer. When detective So-and-So came in, he pointed to a stain on my shirt–which was pizza sauce–and asked me if it was blood. I just frowned at him, and said: “I’ve done enough laundry to know the difference between blood and tomato sauce…Haven’t you?” He then backed off.
I feel for you guizot. Some years ago, it happened to me three times in a span of about six months. First time, I was taking a shortcut home in a back alley at around 3 a.m. when I encountered a police car. They asked for my ID and all. They were looking for a guy who had set fire to a couple of sheds in the previous days. They thought I might be the Neighbourhood Pyromaniac. Then, in broad daylight on a Friday afternoon, as I was about to enter a conevnience store, I was stopped again by police and was searched pretty thoroughly in front of a fully crowded bar terrace. Reason: someone had robbed another store nearby 5 minutes before. I didn’t bother to ask the young cop (he was way too nervous/proud of his catch for my own comfort) if he really thought I would be lackadaisically walking there if I had robbed a nearby store 5 minutes earlier.
Then, months later, I’m in a bar with a friend when two police officers come in and walk directly towards us. There has been a rape in the neighbourhood, they say, and we both look astoundingly like the suspect. Well, to be clear, they have the suspect, but they ask if we would agree to take part in a line-up so the victim can identify the culprit. We say yes, and go to the police station. I’m sure that on the other side of the one-way window, the cops said to the victim about me: “Don’t worry about him. We just hold him 'cause he’s a pyromaniac robber.”
When the line-up was done, the policemen took us back to the bar. But just upon arriving, they received an emergency call. One officer got out of the car, opened the back door and shouted “Quick, get out!”. He got back in and the car left with the full siren and lights on. There were two people right in front of the bar. “Now that’s one way to go out drinking”, one of them said.
no. They had the dice
It is. An Aussie ex-cop I know has a little gold 187 stickpin that he was given by a California homicide detective. Apparently they used to all wear them.
So when do we get “IF I did it” by guizot?
Not murder, just B&E. Just got home from a spaghetti dinner fundraiser for the Good Samaritan Coalition. Putzed on the ‘puter for about 15 minutes. Decided to walk to the corner store for a Root Beer. Corner store is 6 houses away. I get about 4 houses down when a patrol car comes whippin’ around the corner, stops near me. Bitch (sorry; still bitter) gets out, says: “You! Here Now!” A building invasion (it was a business) had occurred just minutes earlier the next street over. If I had walked from where I was then standing to where the crime had occurred, it would have been a 40 meter straight line. The description was: White male, 50 y.o., blue jeans, brown bomber jacket, white sneakers and glasses. Yeah, that’s kind of my autumn outdoor wear…
When I was compelled to stand in front of several (the cavalry had arrived) police cars, the eyewitness, from the back of a squad car, identified me, in the glare of 5 spotlights, as the perpetrator of said B&E.
I’ve never set foot in that building, or on that property.
I have NO police record, no history of police contact. Been a lot of things, but NEVER a burglar. I have a great job at a non-profit. I volunteer for all kinds of stuff, civic & outreach. I’m on the BoD for a regional clinic and the local emergency warming center for the homeless. I’d just gotten home from another spaghetti fundraiser. My life has never been so selfless, goody-goody. </end illustration of irony>
Arrested, cuffed, jailed (mercy! they got some creeps in that place!), booked, arraigned, bound over for trial in Circuit Court. My jury trial for felony Breaking & Entering, and felony Malicious Destruction of Property ($6K worth of broken and chipped glass) is docketed for 11 Jan 07. I’m not facing any prison time, and probably won’t get more than 90 days in jail if I’m convicted, but I’ll get some serious fines, probation, liability for the broken glass, and a felony conviction.
My attorney was a detective for 8 years. He’s playing the fact that once I was arrested, no further investigation followed. No one retrieved the video tape. Yup, there was a videotape. Evidence technicians didn’t search my clothing for glass shards, nor my hands for abrasions. Once I’d been arrested, the cops “knew” they had their man. All that coupled with an attempt to persuade 12 people not smart enough to get out of jury duty that they’ve all gone up to someone and said “Hey Bill!” only to suddenly realize that it wasn’t Bill - just some bloke who looked like Bill. Frankly, at the moment, I have ZERO faith in the system, the attorneys, the judge, the jury, et al. I don’t blame the “eyewitness.” If I’d been in his shoes, and the cops told me “we got the guy,” and I saw me ‘detained’ in the glare of headlights, spotlights, and flashing visibars, I’d have probably would have made the same mistake he did. Eyewitness testimony… HAH!
Statistically, I understand this happens. People are convicted of crimes they didn’t commit. Hell, some states have murdered people for crimes they didn’t commit. Why me? Why not me. It has been an experience that has changed the very core of my being. I’m just not yet sure how. It’s cost me $$$ I didn’t have to throw away on attorneys, transcripts, bonds and booking fees. It’s not an experience I recommend having. In about 1 week, I’ll either be a ‘free’ man with a large legal bill, or I’ll be a convicted felon with lots of legal bills. It’s the crapshoot of a lifetime.
But it’s still not as scary as a visit to the homicide bureau…
Oh my god Way Too Happy, I think your name fits you well. I would be way more upset than you seem to be even though I know you are upset. I think you take the lead now.
Cool!
Just to make it better:
The records that exist cannot be expunged. I will always be prisoner #311958. The trial info & the charges are, and will remain accessible from any computer. If I’m ever offered a position requiring a background check, (humans being humans) “Look! He was charged with a FELONY!” "Not Guilty? Wow, he must’ve had a good lawyer. They wouldn’t have arrested him if he didn’t do anything wrong, right? And Og forbid I’m ever within 1,000 feet of a burgled building again!
The thing with all these is that I can understand the police catching some innocent while they make sure and all that. What kills me is that they never think they owe you anything like an apology once they figure you are not the guy you are looking for. It is just “get out and carry on, so what if your reputation took a hit, we don’t need to worry about that”
Once in a mall a security guy comes to me and asks to see what’s in my bags. Just like that. Not even a good morning. I told him “If what you think is here, you get to put me in jail. What do I get if it isn’t?”. That gave the guy some pause. He cordially explained what was going on, I let him see my bags, he didn’t find what he was looking for, he apologized and left. But do I have to fight to be treated with dignity every time?
A few years ago, a friend of mine was pulling out of a store into the main road. It was getting dark & he didn’t have his headlights on. A cop stopped him for the lights. My friend sat there with his wife, while the cop did a routine check on his license. He figured he’d be out of there in a minute.
Next thing you know, several squad cars come to the scene & the officers surround the car with guns drawn. He has a common last name. Turns out he had not only the same first/middle/last name but also the same birthdate as an escaped murderer from across the country. Luckily, one of the cops knew this guy well enough to know he had not spent several years in prison. He was given a card to hand officers in the future. He was told as long as the other guy was on the loose, he would likely go through the same process any time he was stopped.
I was going to say that the upside of these experiences is the great story (or thread) it will make, but on second thoughts, small comfort.
I know that if I were in that situation, I’d could react by behaving either meekly and submissively, or indignantly and cockily - both of which could work against me.
And yes, it is a crap deal that even if you are innocent, they don’t even have to apologise, let alone compensate. Like customs officers ripping up your luggage and contents at the airport, and delay you to the point that you miss your connection, bus or train, even if they don’t find a thing.
This is the most suspicious alibi I’ve ever heard.
That really sucks, Way Too Happy. It shows how computers are really screwing up people’s lives. Next thing you know, when you want to rent one of those big inflated things that children bounce around in at quinceaneros, they’ll call up your record, and say “No, you are too dangerous to rent a big inflated thing for children to bounce around in.”
If you had a party to go to, it would have been AWESOME if you could have had the cops drop you off there in handcuffs!
takes off red sweater
wrings hands
My little plan worked perfectly.
golf clap
My first semester in college, I narrowly evaded arrest twice on Halloween; once through stealth ninjery (sneaking out of a kegger right as it was being busted) and once through smooth talking. The latter, looking back on it, was against great odds. My friend and I had ditched the party together and some other guy we didn’t know tagged along with us. We walked away from the house and towards campus and I looked back at the house to see police approaching the front door shouting through loudspeakers. A couple blocks down the road, a girl popped out from her front porch and asked us if we had smokes. My buddy did–I didn’t smoke at the time, though I indulged in other chemical vices, several on that night. My friend passed around cigs and the girl passed around cheap vodka. The guy I mentioned earlier who tagged along during the Houdini act didn’t know his limits and started getting inappropriate once the vodka kicked in. My buddy and I–both pretty coherent and rational considering the alcohol and drugs we’d taken in that night–tried our hardest to physically remove him from the girl’s porch and get him somewhere where he couldn’t cause any more trouble. We didn’t get far before another set of cops showed up, sat us down on the nearest curb and asked us questions. I said our tag-along was getting sick (which was true) and we were just trying to get him back to the dorm hall so he could get some rest (not quite as true–after he drank us into our second confrontation with the law in one night, we weren’t particularly sympathetic about how he spent the rest of his night, especially considering that we didn’t even know the dude. As it turned out, he walked off a few minutes later, and probably went to sleep on someone’s lawn. I have no idea how that went for him). I made real nice and pleaded and we got away with a verbal warning to bust our asses back to the dorm and stay inside until morning.
That was pretty messed up; the girl who invited us onto her porch for vodka was just trying to give us each a shot or two for our trouble and cigs, but Mr. Tagalong turned it into a drinking contest. He really made an ass of himself, lying on her porch with his pants around his knees, retching over the side fence. It was bad enough that he instigated a drinking contest against two guys who were both taller, heavier and higher than him, but it wasn’t even at a party, it was on some nice girl’s porch during what was supposed to be a little chill-out session. He gave the girls of that house quite a scare, and the more sober and assertive man I am today would have read him the Riot Act and probably called the cops on him myself.
One down, six to go? :eek:
Was she cute?