Last night about 9 pm as I went into Kmart, a man approached me and begged and pleaded with me to give him a ride downtown (20 miles away), or at least to the metrolink station (about 10 minutes away) so he could get to his job. He said he was in a halfway house, and if he didn’t get to where he needed to be on time, he’d have to go back to jail for 30 more days and wouldn’t be able to be with his family for Christmas. He said he was a Christian and swore on the name of Jesus that he wasn’t making this up. He almost had tears in his eyes. I really wanted to believe him, but he showed me his badge with “Department of Corrections” on it, and I was just uncomfortable with the situation. My Honda hatchback was filled with Christmas gifts, and that’s what I told him.
I suppose I could have rearranged the stuff and fit him in, but in the end I thought that the risk just wasn’t worth it to me. If anything happened to me, it would also affect my family.
Nevertheless, I feel a twinge of guilt for not being able to trust a fellow human being. I have been conned a few times before, but it never involved a stranger getting in my car. I ended up going on my way, and I suppose he approached someone else. I do hope someone else was able to help him.
I’m sure many dopers would have acted as I did, while others might have helped him. What would have been YOUR response?
You did the right thing. I was about to post “I would NEVER allow a stranger into my car!” but, you know, I can’t say that for sure. I might have a brain fart and believe someone like that. What I can say is, his story sounds remarkably like one I used to hear from a subway begger time after time after time. He was looking for money though, not a ride, but it was still “go back to jail, blah, blah, blah, job, blah, blah, blah, money, blah, blah, blah.” I’m betting he had bad intentions.
I hate to sound all sexist here, but my first reaction was if you are a woman, definitely not. If you are a man, maybe. A man doesn’t approach a woman who is alone without knowing what the power dynamic is, and in that situation the woman should be aware of it, too, and not take chances.
A way you could have helped without putting yourself at much risk would have been to go with him to a public place and call his halfway house, job, parole officer or social worker to explain the situation and see how they can help. Or possibly call a local church and see if the pastor and/or a group of volunteers could help the guy. If the guy is up to no good, he will probably just take off once you offer to get official on him.
Hate to say it, but this is probably exactly what he was looking for. Cash.
He figures most wont give him a ride but many will offer cash so he can help himself. I figure he’s a con.
I did give a ride to a woman once. Her car was broken down and she needed a ride home to get help. I tried to help her start her car and she was the one who had to do the trusting, me being a 6’4" male and all.
The guy was a con imo. If he’d been able to get from the halfway house to work before now, why couldn’t he that night? Add in the fact that he was in the parking lot of KMart asking for help and it’s got con written all over it. Maybe I’m just jaded, having worked with too many of these type people over the years. It just sounds like so many of the sob stories I’ve heard over and over and over and over.
Most halfway houses either have transportation or can provide for it through a civic or private group. If his family is that important to him or he to them, why can’t one of them help him? How did he manage to get over there in the first place? If he knew he didn’t have a way back and that there were bad consequences if he didn’t, why did he do so?
But halfway house is all you really need to know. By his own admission he’s either he’s an ex-con or a junkie (or both), neither of whom are particularly trustworthy and both of whom know how to play strangers. I would not have given him a ride and I would not have given him money.
I used to give money to these people with a “there but for the grace of God” attitude, but I learned through working with halfway houses and from hearing the same stories so many time and seeing the same person with the same disaster in the same place several different times that they just can’t be trusted.
Last time I agreed to give someone a ride from K-Mart, it started off with just him, then after I agreed he aded his girlfriend into the equation, then once we were on the road he asked me if he could have the quarters that I keep in my ash tray for parking meters, then he asked me to stop off at the gas station so he could pick up cigarettes, then he started smoking in my car. I felt like a chump the whole time. I’m not likely to give another ride to anyone.
I had a somewhat similar situation a couple of months ago: in my local supermarket parking lot, going into the store, I noticed there was a nice sports car with super-dark tinted windows with a smashed-up front end driving 'round and around the parking lot. It had one of those donut tires on the front right side. They were still going around when I came out, and as I was putting my groceries in my car, they pulled up next to me. The window rolls down, and it’s a late-30s-ish couple. The guy tells me that they’re over visiting from the other side of the state, but they were just in an accident and they need a place to stay but they don’t have a credit card, and they’ve collected just about enough to get them a room for the night, and how about helping them out with $20?
Sure, I had it. But I still said no. My spider-sense got all tingly, and I made some lame-ass excuse, but afterwards, I started thinking: suppose it was true? What would I do in their situation? How would I want people treating me? I should have given them at least $5 bucks, but …
If they had a “nice sports car” chances are they had a bank account. If they car was drivable they could have made it to the bank. They could have called a family member for help. If they were just in an accident where were the police?
My college job was at a Temp agency. I was the guy who interviewed them and made sure they got to work, dealt with clients when they skipped out, etc. So I had regular dealings with P.O.s and halfway houses. One of the regular complaints of POs was that halfway houses gave the folks way too much time to get to work and return. Some of them would get drunk on their way to work, so they could pee and breath clean by the time evening tests came around. And they could because they had so much time.
So this guy you saw probably pissed away his alotted time doing something he shouldn’t, so there goes my sympathy for him if he even was telling the truth.
The bottom line is that (in most cases) for someone who is an adult to be approaching a stranger for a ride there must be no other options available. In most cases a normal adult will have some options to get assistance.
Having been approached quite a few times over the years for cash or a ride 95% of the time it’s an obviously a scam of some kind. If I was a woman instead of a large man there is no way on God’s green earth I would give ride to a strange man and that fact that he would even ask me, would put him in a category of hustling desperation that might turn dangerous.
In the linked example above it would have taken her 5-10 minutes to walk to the location she requested a ride to. I didn’t think about this till well after the event because when someone says “Can you give me a ride?” you’re usually not to deconstruct whether it makes sense for them to ask for help or not. and this is what hustlers count on. The polite impulse to help.
I think you did the right thing, especially if he would have accepted the ride and wasn’t just trying to con some money. You would have basically been all alone with him, and if there were ill intentions you could have had a big problem.
I’ll never let anyone I don’t know in my car again, after an incident I had around the time I got my license. I remember how isolated and private it was in the car. There were people all around but nobody noticed the struggle going on in the car. It’s way too personal of a space, and pretty difficult to defend yourself when you can only use your arms (and wits) and have nowhere to get away to. It wasn’t as serious in my case as it sounds, just a drugged out older guy who I thought was harmless (and didn’t know was high) suddenly getting physical. If he had a knife or other weapon I’d probably have had a big problem.
Well, not that it’s a good idea, but any “X in California is Y” is far too broad to be useful. People hitchhike around Santa Cruz all the time.
To the OP- the he give a reason for his not being able to get around? A break-down is slighty more plausible, but otherwise, if it meant 30 days in jail, I, at least, would make damn sure I wasn’t anywhere where I couldn’t get there in plenty of time.
I’ve had severalsimilarexperiences and I always walk away with a “what if they were telling the truth?” guilt and a case of the logical “why don’t theys?” that’s part real and part rationalization. What really irritates me (as I’ve mentioned before) is the uniformity of the stories, or when the beggar (for that is what they are) is demanding.
The last time I was in D.C. I was literally panhandled before I got from my car into the hotel lobby the first time and then whenever I was on the streets for more than five minutes every time thereafter. One old lady asked me for “a dollah se’nty five, I need it to get to the shelter” and due to her age and pathos I took out a couple of dollars. Rather than be appreciative she said “There’s three of us really, me and my daughter and a friend… we all need to get to the shelter…”. Sorry, I can’t help you. “Well, just take this back and gimme a five then… or a ten would be good if you got it…” and of course I left wishing I hadn’t given her the two dollars. Even if their stories are true, THESE PEOPLE DO NOT HAVE A RIGHT TO YOUR MONEY and it isn’t really “Spare” change (as in “I’ve no use for this, I think I’ll throw it in a fountain”).
I’m sure some are legit, but most are purely hustles from people who are on drugs, mentally ill, a combination thereof, etc… These are people who have no family and no friends willing to help them and are not eligible for state subsidized housing, and there’s a reason there somewhere in most cases that’s not just "Their friends and family are bad people’. I wish I had the resources to help them all but I don’t so I have to choose to help a few, but never under any circumstances whatsoever would I allow one to ride in my car as the risks are simply too great.
Now, if you were in New York City during the current strike and saw someone trudging through the snow trying to get to work, that is another story - maybe.