Cops Pass Up Chance To Sample Traffic-Stopping Breath – March 24, 2010
• Sunday, February 14 1:46 a.m. A “drunk girl” lying on the ground at 11th and F streets was approached by two guys. One of them flashed some sort of badge at someone nearby, and said they were going to take the girl home. But the casually clothed would-be cops didn’t seem quite so real, and another person at the scene made a fuss. At this point, one of the “officers” said “let’s just go,” and when someone tried to stop them, a punch was thrown.
12:57 p.m. A woman reported that as she entered a Valley West storage yard, a traveler slithered in behind her without using an access code. Police went and checked the place, but the trav’s slithering skills must have been highly developed, because he wasn’t found.
4:30 p.m. Some guy in a Uniontown parking lot tried to get two girls to get inside his skeezy molesto-van. They didn’t.
6:24 p.m. A man at a no-excuses Plaza tavern/restaurant walked out without paying for his snack, which, though described as an “appetizer,” apparently only whetted his appetite for larceny. So if you see a man in a hat and unknown clothing, march him back to the Alibi to pay his $8.67.
• Wednesday, February 17 1:36 a.m. At a highly refined soirée at a Union Street apartment complex, some drunk threw a bottle over the fence. It hit someone, and a man came over and punched the bottle-tosser in the face.
2:38 a.m. A woman showed up at the ER with what looked to doctors like a stab wound to her torso. She said she had climbed through a broken window “like she does frequently,” and the glass cut her, but the wound’s appearance was more consistent with a stabbing. She also admitted to taking meth earlier. She gave officers permission to go visit her mobile home, and they found a broken window that correlated with her story. Even the ER docs finally came around to her version.
7:57 a.m. Slithy toves harvested items valued at $200 to $250 from a car at 14th and F streets.
9:11 a.m. The slithy tove business is equally good in Valley West, where one man left his iPod and wallet containing $250 in cash as well as credit cards in his car overnight. His courtesy in leaving the car unlocked for the doorhandle-tryer wasn’t returned, as the passive-aggressive slithy tove rudely left the car door open after reaping the goods within.
9:45 a.m. Not even locking a car in McKinnon Court helped very much, as someone busted in on the driver’s side of a vehicle and stole two wallets and a cell phone. Credit cards were cancelled.
10:10 a.m. An elderly woman in Percheron Court called police, frantically stating that her neighbor needed help. But then she declared, “He doesn’t need help” and hung up. The dispatcher called back, and the woman stated that she had overreacted. She was advised to stay on the line so the dispatcher can be sure everything’s OK.
10:22 a.m. A van in at Giuntoli Lane and Valley East Boulevard was broken into overnight and books stolen.
10:27 a.m. A man’s locked truck was broken into on Valley West Boulevard via the rear window and stole a $450 iPod, a $110 hammer and books valued at $100.
11:53 a.m. A high school student reported that over last year’s Thanksgiving break, a man broke into her apartment and stole cash, rummaged through her underwear drawer and left a photograph of his revolting groinal appurtenance. A neighbor had seen the suspect exiting the apartment, and this day, he was spotted in town and his car license plate recorded. She said she reported it to the high school rather than police, and the school was supposed to tell APD.
11:26 a.m. Management of a Valley West motel reported four people, two dogs and a cat in Room 120. Police stood by as the huddling horde was heave-ho’ed.
5:42 p.m. A woman at the police station front door said that the alcohol-sensing ignition interlock device was “lying” and wouldn’t let her car start. She demanded to be breathalyzed to “prove it wrong,” but was told that APD doesn’t provide breathalyzing-on-demand and to speak with the lawyer who represented her in her DUI case. She cried, speaking nonsensically into the phone for several minutes, then hung up and wandered away.
8:45 p.m. A man left his Acer laptop computer in his unlocked car at a Valley West apartment complex, and in less than two hours a slithy tove had worked its magic.
• Thursday, February 18 1:03 a.m. Some teenagers had a great time drinking, busting bottles and yelling in the cemetery. That is, until all the cop cars and peeved parents showed up. That’s when things became the opposite of fun.
2:07 a.m. As an Olsen Court resident looked on, she said, kids from across the street toilet papered her house and yard.
9:13 a.m. Someone broke into a vacant affordable residence in Valley West and slept there for free.
11:13 a.m. An Old Arcata Road resident said that someone had tied a rope across the street at head-level. Her son ran into it, “damaging” his eye and breaking his glasses.
11:26 p.m. A man called APD asking why his phone had been disconnected. He was advised that he was in fact on the phone at the time, and police don’t have any information on his phone account anyway. He apologized and said he was going to call the phone company.
11:31 p.m. The man called again about his broken phone.
11:43 p.m. After more calls, police visited the man’s mobile home. He was advised that he’d probably have more success dealing with the phone problem after he sobered up.
1:20 p.m. A man in a brown beanie and dreadlocked tied up an “extremely thin and malnourished” pit bull across from a downtown bank. An officer went by, untethered it and took it to the animal shelter.
1:45 p.m. A man came into the ER with a laceration on his head. He said he had been struck by someone in the forest, but he didn’t want to involve police.
2:53 p.m. A man who had reported his 21-speed bike stolen on Feb. 21 said his roommates noticed it unlocked on Ninth Street and brought it home.
4:33 p.m. Two youths illegally riding bikes in the Skate Park more or less dominated the place, preventing skaters from using it. They were cited.
10:30 p.m. A tove committing a vehicle ransack in Ribeiro Court wasn’t slithy enough to elude detection by a resident, and the chase was on. Dropping a wallet in the street as he fled, the thief was pursued by police through an adjacent field, past the hospital and west onto the Bottoms, where he slipped into darkness.
11:17 p.m. A sub-sub-sub genius made it his business to bellow a very upsetting racial epithet on 12th Street between H and K streets.
• Friday, February 19 5:18 a.m. An unknown man made a dramatic entrée onto the porch of a Trojan Street mobile home, waving around a two-and-a-half foot pipe with a metal ball on the end. Having wielded the worrisome man o’ war to his satisfaction, the trailer terrorizer scrambled into a ’90s vintage Dodge mommy-van not exactly befitting the image of a cudgel-swinging swashsbuckler, and roared off toward the freeway.
7:53 a.m. More overnight slithy tovage was discovered at 11th and O streets.
9:35 a.m. A woman who drives a big truck reported being sideswiped by the driver of a BMW (which immediately begs credulity since Beamer drivers are among the most courteous and considerate on the road). Due to the girth and mass of her truck, she didn’t feel it, but it left a scratch. She said the BMW driver was “extremely angry,” and blamed her for tearing his passenger-side mirror off. He then took her information, but didn’t give his, and said he was headed to the Police Department.
11:35 a.m. A woman called to tell police that a year-and-a-half ago, a neighbor had told her 11-year-old daughter that “my man part gets hard.” The girl was afraid, and waited until now to tell her mom. The mother said she just wanted the incident documented.
1:49 p.m. A man was reported aiming a gun at random people at 15th and K streets. It turned out to be a small stick, and he wasn’t pointing it at anyone.
2:40 p.m. A woman is having “an unpleasant situation” with a local business, and when she drove past one of its prinicipals on L.K. Wood Boulevard, she said he swerved toward her and deployed the rigid digit.
3:08 p.m. A belligerent/scary man at a Valley West bus stop turned out to be so drunk it wudn’t funny.
5:50 p.m. When a man whose dog was taken away from him told someone he wanted it back, he said the person accused him of abusing it. Police told him people are entitled to their opinions.
• Saturday, February 20 3:08 a.m. “I’m not a woman!” yelled a woman near a downtown soap shop. Police arrested someone on a disturbing the peace charge.
5:12 p.m. A Samoa Boulevard resident who just got out of jail returned home and reportedly began assaulting roommates. He was arrested and returned to the pokey.
12:30 p.m. A vehicle on Alliance Road was broken into and things that didn’t exist until recently were stolen – an MP3 player and GPS unit.
2:20 p.m. More cat poop throwage on Beverly Drive, where someone has a big issue with other people’s pets.
3 p.m. A man stumbling around and arguing with random people inside a Valley West home of honest goodness made a big scene of some kind in the bathroom. Police found him slumped against a window with a beer in his hand, and took him to the drunk tank.
