AJC.com > Metro > View from the cop
Buckle up for a wild ride
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
What in the heck is going on America?
Gas prices are so bad we’re talking about the good old days when we were paying only three bucks a gallon. Fuel expenses are affecting everything else and now everything is expensive to do or buy or even rent. The mortgage crisis, thanks to the selfish idiots who ALL, in many of our opinions, need to be sitting in a cell, have driven folks out of their homes.
Investments and retirement funds are hurting. You may not be losing money but you’re damn sure not making any. We’ve been through stuff like this before but this time it just seems that this time it’s all hitting us at once. I can’t find my happy place anymore.
I know it’s bad because, and some of you may know this, animals will sometimes sense impeding really bad events. For instance, just before the great Chicago fire, a cow owned by Patrick and Catherine O’Leary kicked over a lantern and said “Oh *@%&^!! I hope the wind doesn’t pick up.”
Well something is going on. My Rottweiler Roxy, born of Satan and who quietly stalks innocent victims for the purposes of our satanic weekend rituals according to idiots who are living close by, has begun acting strangely. I found a crack pipe in the Alpo. The Shih Tsu is using up my co-pays for an analyst and I think the turtles are hitting my Crown Royal after we go to bed.
People are starting to move more towards the edge and yes, crime is reflecting the bad economic times. Shoplifting, normally reserved for teenagers and pill-head housewives, is now seeing Mr. and Mrs. Middle-Class America stuffing pockets and pants with—well not the essentials that you would think a cash-strapped family would go after, like food or baby formula.
No—they’re stealing, instead of buying CD’s, DVD’s, and other small electronic items of entertainment. Not exactly essential of life but due to the hardships, they’re willing to risk jail and a criminal history in the name of entertainment.
Many of these honest-people-doing-dishonest-things do not have the necessary fundamentals of a good shoplifter.
For instance, most new male shoplifters still prefer to stuff any and all items, including chain saws and 19-inch televisions, down their pants like “Hey, it’ll just look like I’m a stud!” No, it looks like you’re fixing to join the Mug-Shot Club. Remember: Stop-Drop-And Take That Stuff Out of Your Pants and Put It Back Where It Belongs. Words of at least semi-wisdom.
We continue to look for alternative fuel sources. It looks like maybe if anything good comes from the bad prices on fuel; it’s the now accelerated efforts to find alternative fuels for our sixty zillion cars, all on the road at the same time on GA 400.
A possible solution to a potential future energy shortage would be to use some of the world’s remaining fossil fuel reserves as an investment in renewable energy infrastructure such as wind power, solar power, tidal power, gerbil power, geothermal power, hydropower, thermal depolymerization, methanol, ethanol and biodiesel, or in an oil lamp; try olive oil, WD-40, canola oil, safflower oil, Vinyl Repair, algae oil or sunflower oil which do not suffer from finite energy reserves, but do have a finite energy flow—but heck, you knew that.
Why limit ourselves here? My uncle Alberto from Cuba, Georgia, right next to the Kroger on Highway 20, claims to have developed a usable fuel using old Slim Whitman records. He gets 45 miles to the gallon but the car yodels when he gets to 50 MPH—a small price to pay.
Well, regardless of how bad things get, don’t forget to find you happy place—and I don’t mean in the bottom of a whisky glass—unless you’re with consenting adults at home listening to a Slim Whitman album. Watch the dogs and when they get funky, something’s fixing to happen. Some signs your dog knows something bad is going to happen: • They’re dressing like Leon Redbone • They’re stuck to the ceiling and smoking Marlboros • They’re gone—note said: Gone to Vegas-You’re on your own • They’re voting Marijuana Reform Party in November
Well sooner or later we’ll get past all this madness and again concentrate on the priorities in life like reforming the designated-hitter rule and whether Lindsay Lohan has a girlfriend. Continue to find your happy place and just start going there more often. Keep an eye on the dogs. They’ll let you know when the coast is clear.
Permalink | Comments (12) | Post your comment |
Crime and Punishment
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Thefts from cars are again becoming the summer event with our local crooks.
As I look these reports over I see the same thing again and again. The items stolen were sitting right there, in plain view, ready to be taken if someone so chooses to walk the path of crime! At some point, it becomes a “victim-compliant” crime.
I have been on record on television, radio, print media and several Moose Lodge speeches as saying that if you will just remove the opportunity, i.e.: the items to be stolen, you will increase the risk, i.e.: the time and noise it takes to break into your car and then start looking around. Don’t make it easy.
Please call 911 if you see anyone walking through the public parking areas in your apartment complexes, looking into cars or even loitering when it seems odd to do so, for instance, at 2 a.m. If you would like literature on thefts from cars, please send me an e-mail and I’ll be glad to send it to you.
Robbery:
Berkley Trace
A man said someone knocked on his door. He answered it and spoke to a man who told him that he needed to talk to him outside. When he got outside, another man, whom he knows, pulled a gun and accused him of stealing his computer. They made the victim go back inside, remove his clothing, and lay down on the kitchen floor. The suspect, who, if you remember he knows, then let two females, who the victim also knows, into the apartment. The bad persons took some money and a small amount of pot that then left in a black Pontiac Grand Prix.
Theft
Hampton Drive
A man called the police and accused another man of stealing his computer monitor. The other guy said he was at the guy’s house but didn’t steal it but neither guy had a receipt. The other guy said he’s bought electronic things from the first guy before when the first guy was short on cash. The report said they were friends until this tragic incident.
Roswell Road
An employee of a restaurant stole $150 from the register while the other employees were tied up. She left and was last seen running down Roswell Road. The employee was earlier confronted about drinking on the job.
Windridge Drive
The resident of an apartment said a woman whom he knows, while in the apartment, took several bottles of medication from his bathroom. She stopped by several days before wanting to purchase sleeping pills from him. The victim told the officer the woman fell and hurt herself while on the drugs she took.
Kingsport Drive
Someone stole a pink and blue 26-inch women’s power-climber bike from her patio. (LOCK and chain your bicycles to something sturdy if you leave them outside.)
Fraud, Forgery, and I.D. Theft:
Scott Valley Road
The victim reported that someone accessed her American Express Card number and charged $3,000 in airline tickets on it.
Burglary:
Aldwych Lane
The victim said someone pried the back door and got into the apartment. The stolen items included a 47” flat screen TV, Surround Sound system, PS3 and games, king size bed.
Spring Creek Lane
Someone entered the victim’s apartment through a bedroom window and took a DVD player, 50 DVD’s, two loaves of bread and a box of cereal.
Northridge Road
The victim found forced entry, through the door and into his apartment. He reported a laptop and his Garfield watch missing. He suspects a former roommate.
Hammond Drive
A woman reported that her residence was burglarized. She returned home and found a key in the door and a fire extinguisher outside. She said she was told by the management that a fire inspection would be conducted on that date. She said her Dell laptop and just over $500 cash are missing.
Mt. Vernon Hwy The victim reported that three extension cords, electric saw, and a box of trash bags were taken from her storage shed.
Castleton Drive
Someone pried the rear window on the back porch of a home and took a Wolf stainless steel six-burner range.
Arrests:
5500 block of PDR
Officers received a call to a medical office after an employee saw a man trying to steal a laptop from an office on the 6th floor. The lookout was given on a man in black pants, white Polo-type shirt. Another responding officer saw a man walking alongside PDR. The man matched the suspect lookout. The officer detained the man and as he questioned him, the lookout was expanded to include a bag which description matched that the man had on him. The suspect, whose name is omitted at this time because I can’t verify his age, was arrested for Burglary. At the time of arrest, he made a rather brilliant comment to the officer. He told the officer that he couldn’t understand why he was being arrested since he only tried to steal the laptop but didn’t actually get it.
27-year old Ruben Perez of Linwood Drive in Smyrna, GA was arrested after a man called police regarding two men who had just stolen his tailgate from his truck and put it into a Cadillac Escalade. The victim followed the men who abandoned the car. The officers found the tailgate and a gun. The officers also found and arrested Perez who was hiding, noisily, in the bushes nearby. The officer said Perez was acting in a suspicious manner— by the way hiding anywhere at 3 in the morning will create some suspicion. Perez was then identified by the victim and taken to jail.
Bright Ideas *
Adolfo Martinez, 33, and Mark Anderson, 26, were indicted for fraud in Las Cruces, N.M., in April, accused of passing forged checks. The men’s plan was to buy Domino’s pizzas with the checks, then have one of the men put on a Pizza Hut shirt and resell the pizzas, by the slice, in a local park or at stores (even though the pizzas were still being carried around in the Domino’s boxes).
Instant Karma:
A 31-year-old man was hospitalized in critical condition in Salt Lake City, hit by cars after running into traffic to avoid paying for a taxi ride he had just taken
Joseph Manzanares, 19, pleaded guilty in April to disorderly conduct in Commerce City, Colo., after police were called to a domestic disturbance, as he and his ex-girlfriend, who are the parents of a toddler, fought over which local street gang’s colors (hers or his) the kid would wear.
Least Competent Criminals:
Should’ve chosen another career: Joshua Crowley, 22, was charged with robbing a Kentucky Fried Chicken restaurant in Camas, Wash., in March after being chased down, wrestled with, and subdued by passerby Mary Chamberlain, 66.
*Courtesy of Chuck Shepherd’s News of the Weird www.newsoftheweird.com
AND FINALLY.. Detective Sandy and I will be on vacation next week. This means that we’ll be at the beach engaging in such activity as frolicking, drinking things with umbrellas in them and lying around not answering our cellphones.
Permalink | Comments (11) | Post your comment |
Crime and Punishment
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Thefts from cars are again becoming the summer event with our local crooks.
As I look these reports over I see the same thing again and again. The items stolen were sitting right there, in plain view, ready to be taken if someone so chooses to walk the path of crime! At some point, it becomes a “victim-compliant” crime.
I have been on record on television, radio, print media and several Moose Lodge speeches as saying that if you will just remove the opportunity, i.e.: the items to be stolen, you will increase the risk, i.e.: the time and noise it takes to break into your car and then start looking around. Don’t make it easy.
Please call 911 if you see anyone walking through the public parking areas in your apartment complexes, looking into cars or even loitering when it seems odd to do so, for instance, at 2 a.m. If you would like literature on thefts from cars, please send me an e-mail and I’ll be glad to send it to you.
Robbery
Berkley Trace
A man said someone knocked on his door. He answered it and spoke to a man who told him that he needed to talk to him outside. When he got outside, another man, whom he knows, pulled a gun and accused him of stealing his computer. They made the victim go back inside, remove his clothing, and lay down on the kitchen floor. The suspect, who, if you remember he knows, then let two females, who the victim also knows, into the apartment. The bad persons took some money and a small amount of pot that then left in a black Pontiac Grand Prix.
Assault A man reported that while at a party in the 1000 block of Pitts Road, he spoke to a woman and then when he left, a man walked up to him and hit him with a beer bottle causing a deep laceration on his face.
Theft
Hampton Drive
A man called the police and accused another man of stealing his computer monitor. The other guy said he was at the guy’s house but didn’t steal it but neither guy had a receipt. The other guy said he’s bought electronic things from the first guy before when the first guy was short on cash. The report said they were friends until this tragic incident.
Roswell Road
An employee of a restaurant stole $150 from the register while the other employees were tied up. She left and was last seen running down Roswell Road. The employee was earlier confronted about drinking on the job.
Windridge Drive
The resident of an apartment said a woman whom he knows, while in the apartment, took several bottles of medication from his bathroom. She stopped by several days before wanting to purchase sleeping pills from him. The victim told the officer the woman fell and hurt herself while on the drugs she took.
Kingsport Drive
Someone stole a pink and blue 26-inch women’s power-climber bike from her patio. (LOCK and chain your bicycles to something sturdy if you leave them outside.)
Fraud, Forgery, and I.D. Theft
Scott Valley Road
The victim reported that someone accessed her American Express Card number and charged $3,000 in airline tickets on it.
Burglary
Aldwych Lane
The victim said someone pried the back door and got into the apartment. The stolen items included a 47” flat screen TV, Surround Sound system, PS3 and games, king size bed.
Spring Creek Lane
Someone entered the victim’s apartment through a bedroom window and took a DVD player, 50 DVD’s, two loaves of bread and a box of cereal.
Northridge Road
The victim found forced entry, through the door and into his apartment. He reported a laptop and his Garfield watch missing. He suspects a former roommate.
Hammond Drive
A woman reported that her residence was burglarized. She returned home and found a key in the door and a fire extinguisher outside. She said she was told by the management that a fire inspection would be conducted on that date. She said her Dell laptop and just over $500 cash are missing.
Mt. Vernon Hwy The victim reported that three extension cords, electric saw, and a box of trash bags were taken from her storage shed.
Castleton Drive
Someone pried the rear window on the back porch of a home and took a Wolf stainless steel six-burner range.
Arrests
5500 block of PDR
Officers received a call to a medical office after an employee saw a man trying to steal a laptop from an office on the 6th floor. The lookout was given on a man in black pants, white Polo-type shirt. Another responding officer saw a man walking alongside PDR. The man matched the suspect lookout. The officer detained the man and as he questioned him, the lookout was expanded to include a bag which description matched that the man had on him. The suspect, whose name is omitted at this time because I can’t verify his age, was arrested for Burglary. At the time of arrest, he made a rather brilliant comment to the officer. He told the officer that he couldn’t understand why he was being arrested since he only tried to steal the laptop but didn’t actually get it.
27-year old Ruben Perez of Linwood Drive in Smyrna, GA was arrested after a man called police regarding two men who had just stolen his tailgate from his truck and put it into a Cadillac Escalade. The victim followed the men who abandoned the car. The officers found the tailgate and a gun. The officers also found and arrested Perez who was hiding, noisily, in the bushes nearby. The officer said Perez was acting in a suspicious manner— by the way hiding anywhere at 3 in the morning will create some suspicion. Perez was then identified by the victim and taken to jail.
Bright Ideas * Adolfo Martinez, 33, and Mark Anderson, 26, were indicted for fraud in Las Cruces, N.M., in April, accused of passing forged checks. The men’s plan was to buy Domino’s pizzas with the checks, then have one of the men put on a Pizza Hut shirt and resell the pizzas, by the slice, in a local park or at stores (even though the pizzas were still being carried around in the Domino’s boxes).
Instant Karma A 31-year-old man was hospitalized in critical condition in Salt Lake City, hit by cars after running into traffic to avoid paying for a taxi ride he had just taken
Joseph Manzanares, 19, pleaded guilty in April to disorderly conduct in Commerce City, Colo., after police were called to a domestic disturbance, as he and his ex-girlfriend, who are the parents of a toddler, fought over which local street gang’s colors (hers or his) the kid would wear.
Least Competent Criminals Should’ve chosen another career: Joshua Crowley, 22, was charged with robbing a Kentucky Fried Chicken restaurant in Camas, Wash., in March after being chased down, wrestled with, and subdued by passerby Mary Chamberlain, 66.
*Courtesy of Chuck Shepherd’s News of the Weird www.newsoftheweird.com
AND FINALLY.. Detective Sandy and I will be on vacation next week. This means that we’ll be at the beach engaging in such activity as frolicking, drinking things with umbrellas in them and lying around not answering our cellphones.
Permalink | Comments (0) | Post your comment |
The History of Doughnuts: By a cop
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Inevitably the week doesn’t pass without some poor guy making a pitiful stab at the fabled doughnut joke.
Along with “He did it” and “It wasn’t me,” it remains one of the top five lamest lines to deliver to an officer.
But did you know how the historical pasts of the doughnut and police officers came together? Read on.
The first recorded history of the doughnut goes back several centuries.
Archaeologists turned up several petrified fried cakes with holes in the center in prehistoric ruins in the Southwestern United States. Because of the difficulty in identifying recipes from fossils, except for what would later be known as the convenient-store burrito, it wasn’t until the 19th century when recorded history gave us the first peek at the doughnut - or olykoeks - as the Dutch called it.
Olykoeks, not to be confused with Oly-Oly-In Free, were composed of dough balls fried in pork fat.
Fast forward to the early 1900’s in Brooklyn, New York. Irish cop Brannagh O’Toole, working a foot beat on Montague Street and Court Street stopped by a sidewalk stand to look at something that he had never seen—a convenient-store burrito.
Deciding on something a little less likely to cause him problems later, he opted for an Olykoek, a name that he couldn’t pronounce. Maybe this was the beginning of the relationship with cops and doughnuts but who knows.
Do cops like doughnuts?
Beyond the mythical association with doughnuts, cops, like just about everyone else, like doughnuts. The association probably had to do more with the convenience of locations and hours. Not many eateries are open at 3 a.m. so the doughnut shop was convenient. Actually, it had more to do with coffee than doughnuts although the sugar in a doughnut was good for the extra boost to get an officer over the 4-7 a.m. hump prior to the Red-Bull days.
Although I have been doughnut-free for several years, thanks to rehab and convenient-store burritos, I preferred the chocolate something or other at Dunkin-Donuts and the hot glazed doughnut at Krispy-Kreme.
For those of you lucky enough to enjoy international travelling, Spudnuts is a favorite in Panama City on West 23rd Street, across from Horacio’s House of International Convenient-Store Burritos.
As far as trends, wings have become popular with the evening-watch cops but unpopular with the fleet-maintenance manager who has to clean all the chicken bones from under the seat.
More health-conscious police traditions have failed to catch on. Most cops will pass on establishments called “The Tofu-Tavern” and McAlphalfa’s” but will dig in at “Sid’s House of Pork-Fried Dough.” Yum.
Now, doughnuts are getting an gourmet dunk.
Permalink | Comments (30) | Post your comment |
A cop’s take on Campbell’s cry for help
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Guess what? Former Atlanta Mayor Bill Campbell’s semi-prison environment has made him realize that he’s a champagne alcoholic.
That’s right. He tried to get into the substance-abuse program back in October but the drug abuse coordinator in Miami, where Campbell is struggling through the hardships of the prep-school style semi-prison life, denied his entry into the program based on the lack of documentation that he had a substance problem. Here’s how the conversation went:
Bill: “Uh, hi. I was sitting over by the pool and I realized that I’m a drunk and / or other substance abuser.”
Substance Person: “Really?”
Bill: “Yeah—uh, substance abuser.”
Substance Person: “What substance?”
Bill: “The kind that if I go into this program, I can get out in June instead of October.”
Substance Person: “Do you have any documentation?”
Bill: “Sure do. I have a letter right here.”
Letter: To Whom It May Concern: Bill has a substance problem. Please put him in the program that gets him out of the semi-prison in June. Thank you, Bill’s cousin, Pete.
Substance Person: “Mr. Campbell, this letter is written on semi-prison stationary.”
Bill: “Well I’ll be—I didn’t know Cousin Pete was here!!”
Substance Person: “Look Mr. Campbell, stop trying to lie your way into this program. You need to get back out there and put in your two hours a day work and your four-o’clock tennis lesson. Suck it up mister! This ain’t no country club—well, not yet, we still haven’t gotten the golf course finished—but you need to do your time and quit trying to con your way out!
Bill: “No fair! My ordeal was too painful and embarrassing to recollect! I can’t tell you how many bottles of champagne or whatever I consumed!”
Substance Person: “Apparently too painful for anyone else to remember as well. Look Mr. Campbell, there has to be documentation that you abused the same substance—champagne in your case, that you want treatment for now. Your documentation says you occasionally made toasts.I mean, how many toasts did you do, let’s say, in a week.”
Bill: “Uh, I don’t know, maybe 849.”
Substance Person: “Nobody can confirm that you ever had a substance problem. They testified in court on it!”
Bill: “My God!! Do you know what this means?”
Substance Person: “No, what?”
Bill: “Those people are on drugs—and / or alcohol! They can’t remember a thing! They need rehab!!”
Substance Person: “Okay Mr. Campbell, I think that you need to go now. You’re late for your spa treatment.”
Bill: “That’s no fair!! This whole justice system is no fair! I should sue you! This whole semi-prison is a sham! I’m boycotting the putting contest tomorrow! No—I’m going further with this protest. I’m voting Libertarian!
Substance Person: “Look Mr. Campbell, this turkey ain’t flying if you know what I mean?”
Bill: Listen to me! I was in self-denial until I was sort of incarcerated in semi-prison where I no longer had access to the alcohol or that stuff you toast with to self-medicate my stress from the trial and the media pressure and the personal tragedies—and all that stuff.”
Substance Person: “Well, by chance was there any stress from accepting tens of thousands of dollars in illegal campaign contributions, cash, travel, and home improvements in exchange for city contracts?”
Bill: “Uh, well, would there by chance be a rehab program for that? You know, something getting me gone by say, June?”
Latest comments
Thank you Lt. Steve.... read the full comment by Tami | Comment on Buckle up for a wild ride Read Buckle up for a wild ride
Lt. Steve it is spelled whinny... read the full comment by Frank | Comment on Buckle up for a wild ride Read Buckle up for a wild ride
I grew up in Cuba, New York. The next town east of Cuba was Friendship. Coincidence?... read the full comment by JoJo | Comment on Buckle up for a wild ride Read Buckle up for a wild ride
Well put, ozxuz!... read the full comment by Stone | Comment on Message to Lithonia: Stop the silliness Read Message to Lithonia: Stop the silliness