Jail Time

Discussion in 'Other Reminiscences' started by Ken Anderson, May 23, 2015.

  1. Ken Anderson

    Ken Anderson Senior Staff
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    I have never been a drinker. If there are good feelings involved with drinking, I usually get sick before that happens. During high school, I would go to parties like everyone else, but I'd nurse one beer for hours, and pour it out when no one was looking. My close friends knew I didn't drink, and it wasn't like I was ashamed of it or anything, but carrying a beer around kept everyone else from bothering me about it.

    One night, during my senior year of high school, I was with some friends behind a Catholic Church. I wasn't even pretending to be drinking that night, but there was beer around. The police came in from both sides of the church and we all scattered. Most everyone crossed the street and went into a brushy area along the river the separates Michigan from Wisconsin in Menominee.

    I ran around a bowling alley, and then started walking down the sidewalk, figuring the police would go after the largest number. I didn't get far before the police chief pulled his car up on the sidewalk in front of me and arrested me. Later, they had a few of the others in jail with me, charged with being minors in possession of beer.

    Everyone else pleaded guilty. After talking to those who were arrested with me, I entered a plea of not guilty. I represented myself in court. The others who were arrested with me testified that I had walked past them but that I hadn't been partying with them. This was a partial truth, since I wasn't drinking, but they made it sound as if I hadn't even been with them. Another friend of mine testified that she had dropped me off at the bowling alley not long before I was arrested. This was a lie.

    The police chief testified that he had chased me from the party, and watched me cross the road and go behind the bowling alley, which was the truth.

    The judge found me not guilty, saying that he could think of a few people who might be mistaken for me on a dark night. It also helped that I had asked to be given a breathalyzer, and the police had turned me down, saying that they weren't charging me with drinking -- they were charging me with being in possession of beer. The judge's son was a friend of mine, and I had been to his house several times.

    All was well. Unfortunately, I got cocky about it and, after the trial, the prosecutor asked me if I was really guilty, and I told him that I had been there, but that I hadn't been drinking.

    That got back to the judge, who felt betrayed. A few months later, near the end of school, in my senior year, I was again arrested for being a minor in possession of beer. Knowing that I couldn't pull it off another time, I entered a plea of guilty, throwing myself at the mercy of a court that wasn't entirely fond of me.

    He sentenced me to seventy days in jail. Basically, all summer, the summer after I graduated from high school.

    Menominee is not a large town, and I wasn't exactly doing hard time. That same day, the sheriff came up to my cell to talk to me.

    "He gave you seventy days for a graduation party?" he asked.

    I explained to him why I probably deserved the seventy days that he gave me. He told me that I didn't have to sit in the cell all day. As long as I stayed within a few blocks of the jail and was back by 5 pm, he would see that I was released from my cell after breakfast. That meant that I could go to the library, to the marina, the bowling alley, and many of the places that I might have gone if I wasn't in jail.

    When the judge left the courthouse, I was sitting on the lawn. He said hello, walked past, and then came back. "Didn't I just sentence you to jail?" he asked. I told him I got off for good behavior. Fortunately, he may have been angry with me but he didn't hate me. His son was a friend of mine.

    Later, another friend of mine was arrested for something, I don't remember what. The sheriff had a cottage on Lake Michigan, and he asked us if we'd like to varnish it for him. Sure, that sounded like a good deal.

    He drove us out there the next morning. He told us that there was no rush. We could take our time, and we could use his boat whenever we wanted to take a long lunch. Oh, and there's beer in the refrigerator, which added a bit of irony to the situation. Fortunately, there was also pop in the refrigerator, along with food, and we could help ourselves.

    We put a couple of coats of varnish on his cottage that summer. Other than to drive us out there and to pick us up, no one ever checked on us. It was a good summer. Kind of like renting a vacation cottage for the summer.
     
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  2. Richard Paradon

    Richard Paradon Supreme Member
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    That was great, Ken! I think if more police and judges were like that, there would be a lot more respect for authority than now. At least in small towns.
     
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  3. Brittany Houser

    Brittany Houser Veteran Member
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    What a great story! I lived in a small southern town growing up, and the sheriff was a sweet decent guy as well. He always tried to give people a break, if he believed they deserved one. Unfortunately, some of his cops were not like that at all. They went after anybody they didn't like, mostly northerners passing through, and drank Jack Daniels while behind the wheel of their police cars. The sheriff finally caught wind of a lot of their shenanigans, and really shook up the department!
     
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  4. Avigail David

    Avigail David Veteran Member
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    The story read like a book, Ken! "If there are good feelings involved with drinking, I usually get sick before that happens." Good starting hook. I enjoyed my reading through to the end. By the way, why didn't you tell the judge the truth about your friends covering you about how you got there being with your friends? I'm sure you didn't want them to lie for you, did you?

    That was so nice about the sheriff. You didn't touch the beer in the fridge?
     
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  5. Pat Baker

    Pat Baker Supreme Member
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    That was a great story and a great lesson you learned at the time. I think when we were kids people were nicer to each other.
     
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  6. Ken Anderson

    Ken Anderson Senior Staff
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    Oh, I was perfectly okay with people lying for me.

    No. My friend did, though; although not much.
     
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  7. Avigail David

    Avigail David Veteran Member
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    The sheriff tried and tested you correctly, then, at the court prisons. He found favor in you , and your friend for the painting job.
     
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    Last edited: May 26, 2015
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  8. Avigail David

    Avigail David Veteran Member
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    Fair enough. In a time of crisis, a matter of between imprisonment for something I didn't do and freedom; they can lie for me. I want my freedom!
     
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  9. Joe Riley

    Joe Riley Supreme Member
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    Thanks for the story Ken! Sounds like the varnished truth to me!;)
     
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  10. Ken Anderson

    Ken Anderson Senior Staff
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    One day, I was speeding home between Menominee and Wallace, Michigan, where I lived. The speed limit was 75 and I was doing a little more than 80 when someone passed me going much faster than I was, which was not alarming since we didn't have a lot of police on the roads in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan then. As the car went past me, the emergency lights came on in what turned out to be a Sheriff's car behind me. I pulled over figuring he was after the guy who had just passed me like I was standing still, but he pulled over behind me. I knew all of the Sheriff's deputies, and this was a guy known a Swede, which might have been strange, since pretty much everyone in that part of the UP was Swedish.

    He walked up to the car and said, "Going a little fast, aren't you Ken?"

    "Me?" I replied. "How about him?" I asked, indicating the car that had passed me up only moments before.

    "Oh, I couldn't catch him," he replied.

    Actually, he had stopped me to tell me to relay a message to my dad, having something to do with Boy Scouts, since he was the Scoutmaster of a Menominee troop.
     
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