Friday, June 22, 2012

Smuggler's Blues part 2

So I really fucked up. Apologies for the banal tone but what landed me inside was really daft and caused me to miss precious time with my beloved wife and bairns and witnessing how fast life goes by is criminal on my part.


I assaulted a police officer and I am damn lucky that his taser was we the only foreign object to penetrate my body because if that electric man dropper had been a .40 caliber bullet from his fully automatic pistol then this post might have been from the afterlife.
Lucky.


Smuggler's Blues part 1 described the situation next door with the world's dumbest drug dealers and their open air policy of business. Also as previously mentioned the FDLE website was awash with pictures and descriptions of their past discretions and this is what had me worried. The simple fact that they were convicted drug dealers and still dealing in public made for many a sleepless night especially when nocturnal thoughts drifted to how close this business was being ventured so close to my children.


Along with the entire neighborhood I planned and held covert meetings to alert the good citizens about the situation next door. The HOA held separate private meetings with officers from the local police department and patrols were stepped up then tripled once the names of the convicted were leaked to the office of the sheriff.
(It was me that leaked the names, shhhh...)
Game on.


Sunday morning, April 29th 7:11 A.M.  I walked to the driveway to grab the Sunday paper, my eyes still heavy from the early rise and the clink of glass from the night prior. Not sure if still in dream I lift the noggin to witness a barrage of blue and red lights not a mere 40 yards away, sirens were off. This blueberry cobbler wake up is further advanced by the made for TV sight of eight (8) fully armed members of the local sheriff's office making their way to my neighbor's step. I pick up the paper and step quietly back in the garage.


I am awake, I am more awake that I have ever been.


How many times have any of you witnessed this type of standoff on television? 50? 100?
Let me tell you something no matter how many times you have watched it whether is was Starsky and Hutch or CSI Miami, when you see it live and that close your realize two things.
I.  Glad I did not choose law enforcement as a career.
2. Glad I did not choose drug dealing as a career.


Problem.
My oldest son (14) was coming home from a sleepover from a friends house down the street, as usual he cuts through the back yards of the neighbors. His friend lives only four houses down and the locals are fine with him cutting through, I have told him time and time again not to cut through the drug house but he was supposed to be home by 7 and decided to take the dangerous shortcut.
Unbeknownst to the lad the raid was green lighted just as he was in the center of the drug house back yard when an unsuspecting officer saw a male running away from the scene. My child was tackled and with the officer's knee driven in my son's back he was cuffed ready to be taken to the van along with the scum that sold drugs in front of children.
Now I am awake, I am more awake than I have ever been. I react.


I plead, no beg that the cops have an innocent bystander but my front driveway courtroom pleas are falling on deaf ears as the protectors of the Innocent are hauling away my son, they will not stop just to listen to me they are assuming he is one of them and was trying to flee. My wife is inconsolable.


Big Problem.
I grabbed the arm of the arresting officer to argue my case and he and turns his attention to me, a shit storm of obvious and tired adjectives is hurled upon me as I offer my wrist in place of my child. My cries for help are completely ignored and I make my final case for the innocence of my 14 year old son.


Once again I am ignored and once again I place my hands on an officer of the law.
Bad idea but what is a father to do?


I don't remember the taser being fired but I do remember the strong overwhelming taste of metal in my mouth.
I am not a slight man and I have never taken a backwards step from a question but from what I have been told I went down like a torpedoed brick wall when I was tasered for laying hands on an officer of the law in the defense of the innocence of my son.
Innocent until proven guilty - not that day.


I did my time as quietly as possible, lucky to be in a county not a state facility. Once the realisation of the situation had clarified the charges were still not dropped, for the laying of hands on an officer of the law is a no-no even if that officer has ones innocent child cuffed and wrongly arrested. Apparently I swore death or justice, I can't remember saying that but the situation played out so quickly so who knows.

So here I am with two new holes in me, I got my left ear pierced in Broughty Ferry, Dundee in 1978 and I swore that would be the last time I would be pierced. Fast forward thirty four years and the latter two piercings are and always will be considered defensive parenting scars.


The world's dumbest drug dealers are gone and I found out later that one of them was released before me!

Sometimes karma kicks hard.

PS. Be nice to American cops.



What's this? we lost 5-1. Lock the bleedin' door.

14 comments:

  1. holy crap man so glad to hear that you are still alive and kicking and the holes are not from bullets. Please behave from now on, eh!

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  2. Walt, I cringe evey time I turn on the lights, the thought of electricity coursing through the bones brings memories of iron saliva and drooling on the pavement.
    Cheers for the wishes.

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  3. I'm sitting here in shock.
    I can't imagine what it must have been like for you and your poor wife and your innocent son.
    It's the stuff nightmares are made of.
    Is there no liason person who can act as intermediary to explain totally your point of view and at least elicit an understanding - if not an apology from the police.
    Do they not acknowledge that you have been working against the drug dealers?

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  4. Pat, at the time of the incident there was only the group of arresting officers and they were in "Ass kicking mode" Which I assume they would have to be prior to knocking on that door. My still and only problem is that officer "X" as I will refer to him did not take one damn second to hear me out and apparently me being agressive triggered his training. Glad to be alive and that my boy is fine.
    Cheers, Sasuage...

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  5. What astonishingly bad timing! A curfew has been the ruin of many a poor boy. Glad to hear that you and your son are okay. What a tale. Awful. But you are correct that it's a good thing it was just a taser. I always wondered what it's like to be tasered. Like, what's it like to be in a car wreck? Or be audited by IRS? Or to survive a plane crash? Things I hope to never have any experience with.

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  6. UB - bad timing indeed.
    It feels like a total shutdown of the body, I forgot to mention that I also wet my britches.
    Keep that to yourself my friend.
    Cheers...

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  7. You were very lucky but I would have probably done the same!

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  8. this brings a totallynew meaning to the phrase dodging a bullet, sugar! glad y'all are home safe! xoxoxox

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  9. Jeezo, SF - hope you're recovering, my friend.

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  10. Mike - one pint at a time my friend

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  11. Holy shit.
    I wouldn't have believed that such things would happen in the land of the free.

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  12. Ahhh. Just catching up, Sausage.

    Incredible.

    I like you even more than I did, and that was considerable.

    Pearl

    p.s. The picture here? Can't remember his name, but I saw that movie just a couple months ago. :-) Loved it, for some perverse reason...

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  13. I can't say that I wouldn't have reacted in the same way. I hope you finally go before a judge with some sense.

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