THE ATHLETE: RESTAURANT STAKEOUT
by John Lee
We have to find ways to clear the courts of the endless stream of 'victimless crimes' that get in the way of serious crimes. There are more important matters for highly skilled judges and prosecutors than minor traffic offenses, loitering and drunkenness. --President Richard M. Nixon
What happens when police stake out and stalk patrons of a restaurant or bar? Six years after the event, the next citizen can vividly recall the traumatic events that occurred to him in the nation's capitol.
Jake was a 25 year old assistant coach at university, with a degree in psychology. On Friday night, he had joined some friends at a local bar after work. After two beers, he and one friend decided to leave early, since they had plans for an early start the next day.
Three blocks from the bar, a police car stopped behind them at a red light. The police turned on their flashing emergency light, and by using their public address speaker, ordered Jake to violate the red light, and pull straight through the intersection. Jake refused to do this, and waited for the light to turn green. When the light turned green, he pulled forward and parked his car on the side of the road in a parking space. Jake had not violated any traffic regulation.
When the police officer walked up to the side of Jake's car, the first thing he said was, "It smells like alcohol. Get out of the car." Jake was not asked whether he had partaken of alcohol, or whether he was a non-drinking designated driver.
Jake was asked if he would voluntarily take a field sobriety test, which he agreed to do. As a former college athlete, he was confident in his ability to pass any skill test. He recited his ABCs perfectly. During the physical portion of the test, he was continually stopped and interupted by the police officer, as if the officer was just making the test up as he went along. One "test" included kicking one leg forward, to head level, then backward, to head level, over and over again. After several kicks, it became impossible to continue at the same height. All in all, he was ordered to perform all the tests nine times. The officer kept saying, "Now try this," as if he were frustrated. Jake asked, "Is there anything else you want?" The officer stated that, "Well, you didn't pass some of them." Jake was then arrested for alleged DWI.
Jake's friend was not allowed to be a witness to Jake's field sobriety test performance. Officers then ordered the friend to move the car, which was already parked in a safe parking spot. His friend refused, fearing entrapment, that he too would then be arrested by these officers.
At the jail, the female officer ordered Jake to quickly recite his cousin's home address and phone number, which Jake did not even know, as if this were yet another sobriety test. Jake responded that he did not remember the information. The female officer then barked, "Hey buddy. I'm not going to get into a pissing match with you."
Jake was then asked to voluntarily take the breath-alcohol test (under threat of losing his license). He chose to exercise his legal right to not take the test. He then asked to call his attorney, and was refused any phone call. He was locked up in jail overnight, in a community cell. He spent the night very concerned that he would not be released from jail until Monday, and would then miss work.
Saturday morning, he was taken before a judge, charged with DWI, then released after paying a cash bail.
Jake's fiancee was a law student at the university. She recommended he contact one of her professors who used to be an assistant district attorney. "He'll know the right way to go about it," she advised.
His attorney met with him for fifteen minutes, before announcing he was cutting a plea bargain with the judge. For $1,500, Jake was told he would only be convicted of "operating while impaired," instead of DWI, and also convicted of not using a turn signal light and running a red light. He would have to attend DWI school for twenty weeks, attend Alcoholics Anonymous for eight weeks, and pay for probation for thirty two weeks. He was able to avoid any further jail sentence, and did not lose his driver's license, since the District of Columbia did not have that authority.
Jake did not tell anyone at his work about the incident, fearing loss of his job. The legal fees and court expenses put a lot of pressure on his budget, since he was not earning very much money. He became afraid to go out with friends, and was ordered to not drink any alcohol as condition of his probation. He and his fiancee eventually broke up, perhaps as a result of this added stress.
Jake feels that he was freight-trained by the justice system and also by his lawyer. He now has absolutely no trust in police officers.
While police officers were preoccupied for several hours with arresting Jake for alleged DWI, a young woman jogger was brutally raped, stabbed and murdered, a mere six blocks away. She had been a legal assistant for the national government.
A footnote to this story occurred six years later, 2,000 miles away. On the eve of the Thanksgiving holiday, Jake was traveling to visit relatives for a fun holiday together. His life was back to normal, doing well in business and with his dream house on the lake. He even had a new fiance.
Nearing his destination, Jake was pulled over by police for having an expired vehicle license tag sticker. He explained to the cop that he must have forgotten to mail in his renewal, and that he would of course take care of it as soon as the court house reopened after the holidays. However, the cop alleged that Jake's driver's license was revoked, according to the government computers.
The cop detained Jake in his police car, and took him to jail. There he was arrested for driving on a revoked license (driving on a revoked license is a criminal offense, not a traffic citation, often with an identical penalty as DWI), finger-printed and had his mug shot photo taken. The government computers apparently showed his Arcania driver's license had been revoked for the past four years, over non-payment of his DWI-related fines in Washington, D.C. Yet his Maryland driver's license had had a clean record when he had exchanged it for an Arcania license. Attempting to explain that the fines (including a reinstatement fee) had been paid many years ago did not do any good. After posting bail, his future father-in-law picked him up at the jail and drove him 80 miles back home. Someone else was recruited to drive his car back as well. The cop followed them to attempt a second arrest, in case Jake had been driving. Police had confiscated his driver's license identification card.
Jake spent several days haggling with government bureaucracies between Washington D.C., Arcania and the local court house. The Arcania government neither accepted the 1992 Washington, D.C. court paperwork (complete with reciepts showing "paid in full"), nor a new 1997 fax that confirmed the same thing. Several times he was verbally abused on the phone by government office workers, and had been abandoned on hold for long distance for as long as 20 minutes. The state government had initially wanted Jake to mail them his vehicle license plate; doing without it would of course devastate his current career as well as his personal freedom. He was eventually allowed to purchase a new sticker for his license tag, but was denied a new driver's license even after paying a reinstatement fee. Jake was forced to drive to work on a revoked driver's license, or risk losing his job (loss of which would cause him to face forclosure on his home mortgage). Strangely, when appling for work at his new coaching job, his Arcania driver's license passed all the detailed checks conducted by his employers, as well as by his insurance company. Without a driver's license, Jake's insurance company would have been able to avoid paying for any expensive crash damage or liability lawsuits, regardless of how many years of premiums he had paid.
When his court date came up, six weeks after his arrest, Jake presented his paperwork to the judge. The rookie cop explained to the judge that there was a "mixup as to the status of his paperwork." Although the local and state computers had been cleared, the national government's National Crime Information Computer (NCIC) had never been cleared. The judge decided that since there had been an obvious computer error, all charges were dismissed, without any fines or court costs. However, since his driver's license had automatically been sent to the state government, it could not be returned to him. A court official responded, "Gee wiz." The rookie cop apologized, "I'm sorry for all the trouble." The next day, Jake traveled to several counties, before finding one that had a driver's license testing station open. After paying $12 for a new license, he can now legally hold down a job and pay his bills. It is unknown whether the NCIC computer has been updated.
Jake had been allegedly driving all over the United States on a revoked license for over four years, without any indication from the government that there had been any problem whatsoever. He is every bit as angry as before, and nearly panics every time he passes a police car. [Interview]
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