387131 Curiosities served
cops and burglars
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Gah! Well, I had the crazy weekend. I worked at the comic shop Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, and some on Sunday, and at the bar Thursday, Friday, and Saturday nights. The true craziness, however, came somewhere in the middle...
It's Saturday morning. I worked at the bar until about 3am, got home, probably went to sleep about 3:30ish. It had been a really warm day, so Sean had opened the downstairs front window for the cats. It was a little too chilly outside to have it open by the time I got home, but the cats were still loving it, so I left it open when I curled up with Sean to go to sleep. (We sleep downstairs on the futon.)
I get woken up at about 6 by some guy in the parking lot screaming over and over that "I'm going to kill you. I'm going to come over there, break down your door and kill you." At first, I figured it was some drunk asshole who knew some of the guys across the parking lot from me and that some drunken squabble had gotten out of hand. A few moments later, I realize that the only voice I hear is his: He's screaming at someone on a cell phone.
A few minutes of forced listening (the guy is often screaming at the very top of his lungs) reveals that he's talking to a girl, that the girl might have been sleeping around on him, and that he is indeed fucked up in some manner (what molotov cocktail of drugs is anyone's guess--maybe he really was just drunk).
The place I live in is an old house that has been converted into three nearly identical apartments, and the garage that was out back has been converted into a fourth. I have the middle apartment--the two people who are in the other apartments were friends of mine even before I moved in; one of them is the landlord. There is a row of five townhouses across the parking lot from me.
Turns out the screaming man is staying the night over at my neighbor Eric's place--Eric comes out and tells the guy to "Be quiet! I have neighbors!" and to come back in the apartment. The guy calms down some, tells the girl he would never hurt her, to please put his stuff out on the porch because he's going to come pick it up (to which Eric says sorry, I'm not doing that tonight, we can deal with that tomorrow) and the guy finally goes inside. It turns out Eric was giving the guy a place to crash because he was so drunk et al and Eric didn't want him to go do anything stupid.
Well Eric goes to bed, and thinks that this other guy goes to bed. All is quiet. Before I can drift back to sleep a car pulls up, and someone goes into Eric's apartment. It sounds like someone stumbles against the wall ("Boy, he is drunk," I think.) and then the door to Eric's apartment opens and the car drives away. All is quiet--I think I only heard one car door.
The car comes back less than two minutes later. Screaming man is having another tantrum, and now there is a sobbing girl out there with him. Turns out the girlfriend came to pick him up, but things aren't going well. He's screaming, she's crying, and it sounds like maybe he kicks her car. I try calling Eric to let him know what's happening, but there's no answer. I start putting on clothes. There is a loud noise outside--turns out that he has jumped over the car to throw her against the side of the building. The people in the townhouses are coming outside and yelling at him to stop, including my brother who happens to live in the middle townhouse (small world). ("That's your brother," Sean says from the bed. "I know, I know," I reply, stumbling into a pair of shorts.) When I come outside there is a great deal of distance between the girl and the guy, and the guy is yelling that he's going to kill all of us too if we don't mind our own business. I'm thinking that since Eric knows this guy, Eric would have the best chance to calm him, so I go to get Eric (who is already on his way out). When we make it back outside the guy is still yelling at the guys from the townhouses, the girl takes off running. One of the townhouse renters and the screaming guy get in a tussle, Eric separates them, and the guy takes off after the girl.
One of the people in the townhouses had already called the cops, so we're waiting for them to show. It takes probably fifteen to twenty minutes. Sean goes back to sleep. I can't sleep at this point, so I'm outside talking to Eric and my brother. Eric can't believe the guy is just going nuts. The police come, speak to us, and roll out to roam the neighborhood looking for these guys (their car is still in the middle of our parking lot). After the cops are gone the screaming (well, not at the moment) guy comes running down the hill, and trips and falls beside the ditch. He just lays there, and I honestly think he's just going to stay there. Then he jumps up and runs behind our apartment building, where the fourth apartment is.
The cops return. We tell them he went around back. Eric's the landlord and gives them permission to search the fourth apartment (though they probably could have gone in anyway, since they were trying to arrest this guy and in "hot pursuit"). He's not in there. One of the cops points up to a window open above (second floor from there in the back). "Whose window is that?"
Let's take a break here to familiarize you with two things: Sean's comatose-like sleeping ability and my non-existent housekeeping skills. First of all, Sean can sleep through just about anything. It's a combination of Navy ROTC/college four to a room/fishingboat in Alaska/having cats experiences. Second, I'm a piler. I have piles of books lining the stairway, piles of clothes next to the laundrybasket, piles of tapes next to the tv upstairs, piles of dishes in one side of the sink (I wash them all at once when one side gets full, or when I run out of forks). I keep meaning to organize it better, clean better, etc., but it's slow to happen.
The cops are in the back with Eric, I'm still out front. The cops come up my direction and I hear Eric say "The girl in the shorts."
Huh?
"Do you have any of your back windows open?" one of the cops asks me.
Oh no.
"No, I don't think so."
"Well one of the windows back there is open."
"Which one?"
"The second."
"That would be Ivy's place."
Ivy comes out from her apartment.
"Ivy, is one of your back windows open?"
"No, I just went by them, they're not open."
Dammit.
I go and open my door. I can see the back window from the doorway. It's open. There are books strewn all over the stairway.
Dammit.
"He's in here."
Sean was downstairs asleep--the guy went in the back window (about midway between the first and second floor) and ran upstairs to hide. The cops swept through with guns drawn ("Who's that?" "That's Sean, he's supposed to be here.") to pepper spray the guy in my upstairs. Cops tripped over cat toys as they were dragging him out, books were trampled but mostly unhurt, and the cop was right: pepper spray wipes away surprisingly easy with water (though I still detect a slight pepperiness on the air up there--luckily it's mostly storage space at the moment, since Wheaten busted the waterbed many moons ago).
The guy yelled and screamed outside even after he was cuffed--the police were waiting for another vehicle to come and take him away while they took depositions from all of us. He threatened to burn down the townhouse (in front of the cops, no less) and to "get" us, etc. They've got him on 8 or 9 different charges, including domestic assault, assault, and burglary.
And how can they get him for burglary when he wasn't stealing? Let's review!
Traditionally (meaning in ye olde England times) burglary is:
1) Breaking
2) and entering
3) into the dwelling place
4) of another
5) at night
6) with the intent of commiting a felony.
The law is different from state to state, but in most states the law ditched the at night bit and expanded dwelling place to include businesses and even expanded felony to include other crimes... Oh, and "breaking" can be as simple as opening the door--or a window, or even pushing an open door or window more open. "...breaking the plane of the home."
As for the "felony" he was intending to commit, I'm betting that evading arrest is good enough here.
I had to go to law school to learn that.
Other priceless gems from the experience:
After the cops entered my apartment, but before they brought the guy out, Eric and my brother poked their heads in my apartment to see what was going on, to see Sean sitting on the edge of the bed calmly smoking a cigarette. "Hey guys, what's up?" Sean said. ( Yes, the cops coming through did wake him and he knew what was going on. Still funny, though.)
..
Cop: Have you been drinking?
SG: No, I wasn't drinking!
Cop: Well what drugs are you on?
SG: Nothing but alcohol!
...
SG: I didn't break in! Eric! Tell them I was invited! I didn't break in to your place!
Eric: No, but that wasn't my place they found you in. That was the neighbor's place.
SG: That wasn't your place?
Eric: No.
SG: Oh. My bad.
...
SG: I didn't do nothin'! I didn't! Ask her! That's why she ran!
...
SG: You pepper-sprayed me and I didn't do nothin'! I'm gonna sue! I'm going to sue!
Cop: Yeah, get in line.
The girl was afraid to come back while he was still there. She came down after they took him away (the cops went up to where she was to talk to her). One side of her face was swollen, and the eye swelled nearly shut.
One of the cops told me, sadly, he'd bet his paycheck that she'd be bailing him out in a few hours. Especially since she'd come to him after he said he was going to kill her, it's not a bet I was willing to take.
It's Saturday morning. I worked at the bar until about 3am, got home, probably went to sleep about 3:30ish. It had been a really warm day, so Sean had opened the downstairs front window for the cats. It was a little too chilly outside to have it open by the time I got home, but the cats were still loving it, so I left it open when I curled up with Sean to go to sleep. (We sleep downstairs on the futon.)
I get woken up at about 6 by some guy in the parking lot screaming over and over that "I'm going to kill you. I'm going to come over there, break down your door and kill you." At first, I figured it was some drunk asshole who knew some of the guys across the parking lot from me and that some drunken squabble had gotten out of hand. A few moments later, I realize that the only voice I hear is his: He's screaming at someone on a cell phone.
A few minutes of forced listening (the guy is often screaming at the very top of his lungs) reveals that he's talking to a girl, that the girl might have been sleeping around on him, and that he is indeed fucked up in some manner (what molotov cocktail of drugs is anyone's guess--maybe he really was just drunk).
The place I live in is an old house that has been converted into three nearly identical apartments, and the garage that was out back has been converted into a fourth. I have the middle apartment--the two people who are in the other apartments were friends of mine even before I moved in; one of them is the landlord. There is a row of five townhouses across the parking lot from me.
Turns out the screaming man is staying the night over at my neighbor Eric's place--Eric comes out and tells the guy to "Be quiet! I have neighbors!" and to come back in the apartment. The guy calms down some, tells the girl he would never hurt her, to please put his stuff out on the porch because he's going to come pick it up (to which Eric says sorry, I'm not doing that tonight, we can deal with that tomorrow) and the guy finally goes inside. It turns out Eric was giving the guy a place to crash because he was so drunk et al and Eric didn't want him to go do anything stupid.
Well Eric goes to bed, and thinks that this other guy goes to bed. All is quiet. Before I can drift back to sleep a car pulls up, and someone goes into Eric's apartment. It sounds like someone stumbles against the wall ("Boy, he is drunk," I think.) and then the door to Eric's apartment opens and the car drives away. All is quiet--I think I only heard one car door.
The car comes back less than two minutes later. Screaming man is having another tantrum, and now there is a sobbing girl out there with him. Turns out the girlfriend came to pick him up, but things aren't going well. He's screaming, she's crying, and it sounds like maybe he kicks her car. I try calling Eric to let him know what's happening, but there's no answer. I start putting on clothes. There is a loud noise outside--turns out that he has jumped over the car to throw her against the side of the building. The people in the townhouses are coming outside and yelling at him to stop, including my brother who happens to live in the middle townhouse (small world). ("That's your brother," Sean says from the bed. "I know, I know," I reply, stumbling into a pair of shorts.) When I come outside there is a great deal of distance between the girl and the guy, and the guy is yelling that he's going to kill all of us too if we don't mind our own business. I'm thinking that since Eric knows this guy, Eric would have the best chance to calm him, so I go to get Eric (who is already on his way out). When we make it back outside the guy is still yelling at the guys from the townhouses, the girl takes off running. One of the townhouse renters and the screaming guy get in a tussle, Eric separates them, and the guy takes off after the girl.
One of the people in the townhouses had already called the cops, so we're waiting for them to show. It takes probably fifteen to twenty minutes. Sean goes back to sleep. I can't sleep at this point, so I'm outside talking to Eric and my brother. Eric can't believe the guy is just going nuts. The police come, speak to us, and roll out to roam the neighborhood looking for these guys (their car is still in the middle of our parking lot). After the cops are gone the screaming (well, not at the moment) guy comes running down the hill, and trips and falls beside the ditch. He just lays there, and I honestly think he's just going to stay there. Then he jumps up and runs behind our apartment building, where the fourth apartment is.
The cops return. We tell them he went around back. Eric's the landlord and gives them permission to search the fourth apartment (though they probably could have gone in anyway, since they were trying to arrest this guy and in "hot pursuit"). He's not in there. One of the cops points up to a window open above (second floor from there in the back). "Whose window is that?"
Let's take a break here to familiarize you with two things: Sean's comatose-like sleeping ability and my non-existent housekeeping skills. First of all, Sean can sleep through just about anything. It's a combination of Navy ROTC/college four to a room/fishingboat in Alaska/having cats experiences. Second, I'm a piler. I have piles of books lining the stairway, piles of clothes next to the laundrybasket, piles of tapes next to the tv upstairs, piles of dishes in one side of the sink (I wash them all at once when one side gets full, or when I run out of forks). I keep meaning to organize it better, clean better, etc., but it's slow to happen.
The cops are in the back with Eric, I'm still out front. The cops come up my direction and I hear Eric say "The girl in the shorts."
Huh?
"Do you have any of your back windows open?" one of the cops asks me.
Oh no.
"No, I don't think so."
"Well one of the windows back there is open."
"Which one?"
"The second."
"That would be Ivy's place."
Ivy comes out from her apartment.
"Ivy, is one of your back windows open?"
"No, I just went by them, they're not open."
Dammit.
I go and open my door. I can see the back window from the doorway. It's open. There are books strewn all over the stairway.
Dammit.
"He's in here."
Sean was downstairs asleep--the guy went in the back window (about midway between the first and second floor) and ran upstairs to hide. The cops swept through with guns drawn ("Who's that?" "That's Sean, he's supposed to be here.") to pepper spray the guy in my upstairs. Cops tripped over cat toys as they were dragging him out, books were trampled but mostly unhurt, and the cop was right: pepper spray wipes away surprisingly easy with water (though I still detect a slight pepperiness on the air up there--luckily it's mostly storage space at the moment, since Wheaten busted the waterbed many moons ago).
The guy yelled and screamed outside even after he was cuffed--the police were waiting for another vehicle to come and take him away while they took depositions from all of us. He threatened to burn down the townhouse (in front of the cops, no less) and to "get" us, etc. They've got him on 8 or 9 different charges, including domestic assault, assault, and burglary.
And how can they get him for burglary when he wasn't stealing? Let's review!
Traditionally (meaning in ye olde England times) burglary is:
1) Breaking
2) and entering
3) into the dwelling place
4) of another
5) at night
6) with the intent of commiting a felony.
The law is different from state to state, but in most states the law ditched the at night bit and expanded dwelling place to include businesses and even expanded felony to include other crimes... Oh, and "breaking" can be as simple as opening the door--or a window, or even pushing an open door or window more open. "...breaking the plane of the home."
As for the "felony" he was intending to commit, I'm betting that evading arrest is good enough here.
I had to go to law school to learn that.
Other priceless gems from the experience:
After the cops entered my apartment, but before they brought the guy out, Eric and my brother poked their heads in my apartment to see what was going on, to see Sean sitting on the edge of the bed calmly smoking a cigarette. "Hey guys, what's up?" Sean said. ( Yes, the cops coming through did wake him and he knew what was going on. Still funny, though.)
..
Cop: Have you been drinking?
SG: No, I wasn't drinking!
Cop: Well what drugs are you on?
SG: Nothing but alcohol!
...
SG: I didn't break in! Eric! Tell them I was invited! I didn't break in to your place!
Eric: No, but that wasn't my place they found you in. That was the neighbor's place.
SG: That wasn't your place?
Eric: No.
SG: Oh. My bad.
...
SG: I didn't do nothin'! I didn't! Ask her! That's why she ran!
...
SG: You pepper-sprayed me and I didn't do nothin'! I'm gonna sue! I'm going to sue!
Cop: Yeah, get in line.
The girl was afraid to come back while he was still there. She came down after they took him away (the cops went up to where she was to talk to her). One side of her face was swollen, and the eye swelled nearly shut.
One of the cops told me, sadly, he'd bet his paycheck that she'd be bailing him out in a few hours. Especially since she'd come to him after he said he was going to kill her, it's not a bet I was willing to take.
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