Kids with Guns: September 2003 - Part I

The standard advice that I received so far from any FWPD officers who were willing to speak with me was to simply call the desk sergeant when I saw suspicious activity. Of course, this seemed to contradict the wishes of Officer Forsyth, who appeared to be the one that had to manage such information. Officer Marshall was the only FWPD officer who seemed to be willing to actually engage me in a meaningful way about tackling the problem.

The start of this month marked nearly five weeks since Officer Marshall had promised to call me back, and two unreturned messages had been left with him as well. From my understanding, Marshall was the top of the ranks. If he wouldn’t return my calls, and the problems continued, I wasn’t really sure what other options I had.

Friday, September 5 I called Officer Marshall again, and left a third message in as many weeks.

Monday, September 8 At about ten in the evening, I heard a knock on my front door and found Officer Bayard standing on my front porch. Without introduction, he simply asked “Do you own a gun?” When I answered yes, he held up a clear plastic bag that contained a gun and said “Is this it?” I told him that my gun was inside my house and asked why he wanted to know. He said that this gun was found in the bush in my front yard. Then, without another word, he turned around and walked back to the sidewalk.

There was a patrol car and an unmarked car in the intersection. There were two uniformed officers (including Bayard) and an undercover officer wearing just shorts and a t-shirt. Bernie was standing on the corner, his hands cuffed behind him, and his mother, Abby, was there as well. I listened from my porch as the group talked. Apparently Bernie had been standing on the corner in front of my house. When he saw an approaching patrol car, he ran into my yard and dumped the gun. This was the reason the officer gave for stopping and searching him.

Bernie was wearing an empty shoulder holster, and I do not know if he was carrying any drugs when they searched him. Perhaps he tossed them also (might explain why the bush grew so erratically that year). The officers had asked Bernie if anybody lived in my house, and of course he lied and said no. His mother had seen the commotion and came over to check on her son. It was probably only because she informed the officers that I lived there that they even bothered to knock on my door. Otherwise, I likely would have never even known this event had happened.

According to the police, they did not have enough evidence to arrest Bernie at that time. But they took the gun and said it would be checked for finger prints. After the police left, I walked over and talked to Abby then told Bernie that he or I would likely end up dead if he kept playing these type of games.

Tuesday, September 9 I called FWPD front desk to request a copy of the incident report from last night. I was told that I needed to call Officer Bayard to get approval as it was part of a narcotics investigation. I called Officer Bayard and left a message requesting a copy of the report.

Wednesday, September 10 I called Vic, someone I knew at the Frost Illustrated Newspaper, to talk about the situation here. He invited me to come in and speak with him. I went there and we spoke together for about an hour. He agreed that it was strange that FWPD was so reluctant to engage me on this. He told me he’d look into my situation and see what he could find out. He warned that it was a sensitive area though and that it would probably take a while to find out anything.

When I returned home, I began to think about the current situation. Why should I have to ask a reporter to look into this for me? Why should I accept that the FWPD, whose salaries I pay with my taxes, had ignored me for so long on this very serious problem. As I thought more about this, I began to get angry. Why should I have to wait to find some relief? Why couldn’t FWPD just do their damn job? And why wouldn’t anyone there ever return my calls?

What I did next might seem stupid, but I was so frustrated I didn’t know what else to do. I was tired of seeing large groups of drug dealers standing on my property every time I came home. I called Officer Marshall and left the following message: “This is not a threat. This is a promise that I will be allowed to walk in and out of my house without fear for my safety. Please contact me to let me know what you are doing to address this problem. If you can’t help me with this problem, I will go above you and above the FWPD if necessary. Please return my call.”

I thought about how my last three calls to Marshall had been ignored, so I wanted to make sure he heard me this time. I called Officer Marshall back and left another message. This time I was being a real smart-ass, but I think my point was still valid. There had been a wrecked up car parked across the street from me for several days now, and I used that as an opening for my next message to Officer Marshall.

This time I said “Look, there’s an abandoned car in front of my house and I wonder if you could get it towed. I know that’s probably not your department, but since you don’t seem to be doing your own job, maybe you could take care of this for me. I’ll just call the Allen County Sheriff’s Department for help with the drug problems, since you’re either unwilling or unable to help with that. Thanks a lot.”

I sat on my front porch, cooling down, and contemplating the fact that I had basically just told one of FWPD’s top cops to go screw himself. Of course I framed it with more civilized words so that I could not be accused of assaulting an officer, but the message was clearly there. I began to wonder what Officer Marshall’s response to this might be; how long it would take before the first squad car arrived; how many cops he might send to beat the crap out of me. Still, for the most part, I did not regret it. I pay these cop’s salaries, and they’re all going to tell me to go to hell? Well, they can go to hell too!

Having vented my frustrations, I began to gain a clearer perspective of the situation. Although my anger towards Officer Marshall may have been justified, expressing it in the way I did would certainly bring no relief. I called Officer Marshall’s voicemail one final time and apologized for my rudeness, but added that the situation here was stressing me out. I told him that I really needed some help with the problems here. Shortly after leaving this last message, Officer Marshall called me back. I again apologized for my rudeness. I pointed out how frustrated I was becoming with the problems I faced, and said it seemed like he had chosen to ignore me.

Officer Marshall had several things to say to me. First was “Please don’t threaten us, we don’t respond well to that.” This was followed with “I understand you are at your wits end right now, but don’t stick your neck out. Let us do our job.” He went on to say that he’s not ignoring me, but he hadn’t received my previous messages because he shares a line with others. He said they (FWPD) are doing a lot but there are some things he can’t tell me due to privileged information.

Officer Marshall agreed to meet with me in person to discuss the situation. He asked if I wanted to come to the station but I requested that he visit my house instead. I said that I thought these guys (drug dealers) need to realize that some people aren’t afraid to speak with the police. Officer Marshall agreed to meet at my house on Friday.

The situation with Bernie was troubling in many ways. The mere fact that an armed juvenile was “patrolling” the sidewalk in front of my house was bad enough, but my relationship with his mother made it even more troubling. Normally, if a drug dealer hid his gun in my yard, I would simply take a “fuck-you” approach to that person. But Abby was a good friend, and I had to consider that as I decided how to respond to this latest development.

I’d like to know what eventually happened to that gun, but I’m sure that is unlikely as FWPD still will not even allow me to obtain a copy of the incident report from that night. It certainly must be frustrating for the police when a citizen unnecessarily interferes in their business like this. I mean, how dare I request information about an armed drug dealer who was in my own front yard. I guess I need to just shut up and learn to mind my own business. And apparently, according to FWPD, this does not include my own front yard.

When I think back on this today, I still find it inexcusable that Officer Marshall let nearly six weeks lapse after our first discussion before contacting me again. As for the “threat,” I simply said I would seek help elsewhere if none was to be found from FWPD. I really consider that more an exercise of my civil rights than a threat. His call seemed to only come about as the result of my leaving an impolite message, and his explanation that he hadn’t received my previous three calls, while he just happened to get these ones, seemed disingenuous.

But Officer Marshall had called me back though. And he seemed to accept my apology for my brash behavior, agreeing to meet with me in person to discuss the situation in more depth. Once again, I was feeling more positive about the situation here.