That’s Some Killer Weed… Really, It Will Kill You – August 16, 2011
• Monday, July 11 6:52 p.m. An older man with a backpack was seen perusing residences while writing in a notebook and claimed to be part of a group called “Historic Arcata.” The caller feared that he was casing the area, but no, he was really with Historic Sites Society of Arcata.
11 p.m. “I want to break some shit,” quipped one hoodlum to the other. He followed up on his primal urge by reaching out and smashing the mirror on a parked car. Both the shit-breaker and his more passive colleague were Pinked for drunkenness.
• Tuesday, July 12 2:37 a.m. A dumpster combusted behind some Plaza apartments. This again.
9:42 a.m. An employee at an Arcata business has a heart condition and lives alone. When she didn’t show up for work, a co-worker became concerned and asked police to check in on her. The woman was taken to the hospital.
9:56 a.m. Childish fun at a Redwood Park day camp was marred somewhat by the thirty-something manchild in a black hoodie with an open bottle of Jagermeister, but he staggered off after setting a perfectly terrible example.
11:40 a.m. A Crescent Way man only noticed someone had stuck a “Free” sign on his flatbed trailer at the same time he noticed someone trying to take it.
1:26 p.m. A piece of pipe intruded on Highway 101, but couldn’t be located.
4:49 p.m. A man who felt like he was dangerous to himself and others had missed a mental health appointment and now wasn’t answering his phone. Police got no answer at the door, and his car was missing.
7:59 p.m. A man who had undergone brain surgery two weeks prior was acting oddly, and his parents feared complications. He was transported to the hospital.
8:02 p.m. A fairly inebriated man decided he wanted to join in a local baseball game and subsequently charged onto the field. Nobody else seemed quite as excited about the idea as him, though, as he was detained on left field until arrested and transported to Planet Inebrion.
9:24 p.m. Tree-climbers on the Plaza had already scuttled by the time police arrived.
• Wednesday, July 13 6:37 a.m. A visitor from out of town couldn’t bring his dogs inside overnight, so he tied them to his truck, with neighbors having to listen to their piteous whining all night.
9:27 a.m. A reported pedestrian vs. vehicle collision on Crescent Way led to three drunk driving arrests.
11:04 a.m. A man reported that after an argument with his roommate the previous night, she texted him to say that she had put all his stuff – including his pet ferret – out on the front porch and then changed the locks. He organized a truck to go get his belongings off the lawn, and wanted to look inside the house to make sure nothing of his was still inside.
5:31 p.m. A youth threw a bottle at an Alliance Road front door and barked some kind of malediction at the resident, but defying expectations, these acts did not make the world a better place.
• Thursday, June 14 6:49 a.m. Yep, there are bears a-wandering again in the Brae and environs.
9:06 a.m. A grandmother took a call from someone claiming to be her grandson who said he had been arrested and needed her to wire him money. Since it wasn’t her grandson, she didn’t fall for the scam and instead told police.
9:49 a.m. The house ejectee came in to APD and was very upset. He made a scene in the APD lobby, arguing with reception staff, demanding to know why the roommate who had thrown him out hadn’t been arrested. He claimed she had “destroyed” property belonging to him and his girlfriend right in front of police officers who were standing by when he picked his stuff up. He also claimed the roommate had driven up on a sidewalk to run him and his girlfriend over. He was told that if he could find any witnesses, police would interview them. The man was last seen arguing with his girlfriend about the matter.
11:20 a.m. They never did find the poor dog with a cone on its head reported at the confluence of G and H streets.
5:51 p.m. A Diamond Drive resident reported seeing a neighbor in red shirt loading a long-barreled rifle on the back porch and then going back inside his house. Police talked to the man, found that it was a pellet gun but advised him to be aware of things in the distance beyond what he was shooting at.
6:32 p.m. When a car struck a fire hydrant on Calfornia Avenue, the driver didn’t stick around to enjoy the gusher. He tossed something behind some bushes and boogied on foot down the hill. Wasted water flowed down the gutter for 45 minutes, lowering water pressure for residents throughout the neighborhood and causing multiple complaints.
10:46 p.m. A woman said that during an argument with a friend, he struck her with a piece of wood from a painting. He was said to be wearing either a puffy jacket or a hoodie (how do you confuse those two garments?) and carrying the assault painting, but police didn’t locate him.
11:24 p.m. A woman reported a co-worker having egged her house, and she wanted the harassment ended.
11:26 p.m. An unusual arrangement whereby a man and his ex-something still live together but sleep separately in the same house broke down when she took their child into her bedroom with her other child, then locked the door and went to sleep. Police had no court order on file to enforce, and suggested that he seek one.
• Friday, July 15 1:47 a.m. Four stumbly mumblers were seen motating erratically toward a Pontiac-like car near Ninth and G streets. The quixotic quartet’s conversation centered on how way too wasted they were, and yet they seemed to be laying the theoretical groundwork for “smoking a bowl.” Police weren’t far away, and came and arrested two on public drunkenness charges.
6:50 a.m. An I Street cannabis cooperative reported travelers having just burgled a dumpster full of trim. A security person had left the dumpster open while walking around the south part of building, and in that vulnerable interval the hobos happily happened upon the THC treasure chest. At this point they mined it for marijuana and headed for the Plaza. But, warned the security guy, the dumpster dope was “bad” and if the travs smoked it, they would die. He said he would call if the doomed dopers trespassed on the property prior to their imminent demise, and was strongly advised to tell the cannabis cooperative that they need a better system for disposing of their toxic trim.
7:18 a.m. A nearby restaurant reported a bearded man in a hoodie breaking into its dumpster, possibly to obtain a last meal. Police never found him.
9:28 a.m. The groundscore theme o’ the morn was perpetuated with discovery of multiple contractor bags full of pot and pipes dumped near the train tracks. Police advised the caller to dispose of the desultory dope.
11:12 a.m. A gray-haired man in an army jacket at the bus station was reported lying in a “very awkward position” on top of his possessions. he was awoken and found not to be drunk or anything.
11:36 a.m. Four folks were seen using a car in a Valley West parking lot as a base of operations for panhandling in the area. Police found that one had a warrant out of Ventura County, and that person was arrested.
12:28 p.m. Someone donated ammunition to a thrift store, employees of which called police to come and pick it up. They were referred to a sporting goods store.
2:45 p.m. A woman got a letter from a “bank” asking for her Social Security number, which she sent by return mail. Not long after, a computer company called to confirm a purchase she hadn’t made, and a department store called about the new credit account she was opening, but hadn’t.
2:47 p.m. A woman reported that someone had taken her deceased husband’s truck for a test drive a month ago, and now wouldn’t pay for it or return it.
3:22 p.m. A car coated with “various sayings” in spray paint was reported speeding out of an apartment complex and up Buttermilk Lane.
4:09 p.m. Larval hooligans in Valley West knocked down fence boards and threw a ball at a car. A witness was worried that the lads might hurt someone, or themselves.
4:09 p.m. At the same time, a twenty-something man threw a beer bottle at a car, cracking the windshield.
8:22 p.m. A drunk waving a knife around in front of the bars was arrested.
8:28 p.m. A children’s recreational program featuring an overnight campout in Redwood Park suffered an incursion of hyper-oblivious obnoxillators. So here are the little kids enjoying the evening program when this disrepute-mobile roars into the parking lot at high speed, then comes to a stop so that the passel of dolts within can serenade each other (and the camp kids) with obscenities. That pastime eventually gave way to further idiocratic indulgences, primarily sitting in the car and revving the engine. Having completed their demonstration of Adults Behaving Badly, the bozo brigade got out and marched up into the woods.
• Saturday, July 16 5:47 a.m. After hearing someone clomping around on his roof, a citizen followed two suspected graffiti taggers until police caught up with and arrested them. Eor and Karuk had been on a vandalism tear, and are now on the hook for felony damage tallied at $2,900 and rising.
