Crime Fighting on the Wild Wild South End
I got a junkie neighbor up behind me. I know what you’re thinking: I got lots of neighbors with trash accumulating faster than that mudslide up at Oso. I don’t mean a junk collector. I mean a junkie. Addict. Needles. Heroin. He tried committing himself to a rehab joint, but … well, our society doesn’t have the money to run many of those these days. Too busy, I guess, giving tax breaks to the hedge fund managers and the corporations to find a few pennies for programs a little closer to the ground here. He could get on a waiting list, go to the back of the line, continue shooting up until he could receive treatment.
So that’s what he did. Course, he also makes a habit of criminal behavior other than drug abuse. For one, he’s a thief. Down the road a nursery was missing a lot of plants and our boy, let’s call him Junkie Jim but it’s not his real name, Junkie Jim was seen carting a truckload of plants down the road back to his property where he did a Martha Stewart landscaping job. Now, I appreciate the urge to tidy up the place. Join the suburb. Maybe have us neighbors in for tea and crumpets. Join the Welcome Wagon for some meet and greet. But … he probably shouldn’t have stolen the shrubbery and the ornamentals.
The deputies came after they were tipped off by the old timer who’d seen Jim transporting his booty home. They questioned him and Jim, being a laid back sort of stoner dude, said, yeah, he stole the plants. Confession, case closed, fine example of police work and citizen involvement, almost a model for the rest of the nation. Maybe the court would be lenient since he was cooperative.
Except for one small thing. The cops never charged him, the case never went to the prosecutor’s office and the court never convened. Junkie Jim has the purloined plants budding out nicely this spring and everybody but the nursery seems happy about this. Well, maybe not me. I know an open and shut case when I see one, but I hate the open and shut mouth on this one. What the hey?? I was just at an event where the Sheriff spoke ad infinitum on the need for more money for deputies, more taxes for his department, more more more. What sheriff in what county in what country doesn’t sing the same song????? But I got a question and I bet you know what it is. Why would I give the cops one more dime when they won’t arrest a thief they took the time to come and question and who confesses on the spot? Give me a toy badge and let me play deputy for a year. I’ll give the taxpayer the same quality crimefighting and it won’t cost you one penny.
I know it’s the South End, but it worries me when the police catch a thief and figure why spend money prosecuting. Just a bunch of plants to them, I guess. Me and the neighbors are chaining down our rhodies. And we won’t be bothering to call 911 in the future. Why waste their time or our time?
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