About three weeks after we moved in to Heatherwood, I had occasion to travel out of town. I don’t generally answer phone calls at odd hours, nor from blocked numbers, so I thought it odd my phone was blowing up from about 6:00 in the morning. It was a busy day, so I didn’t get a chance to check my messages until the afternoon, the sort of thing that’s normally no problem, but it turned out the calls were from the cops, and my car had been recovered.
I called the officer back and he told me my car was already recovered, and I could come get it. I was delighted, since I didn’t know it was gone. It wasn’t until I asked for details he told me it had been pretty smashed up, and he didn’t indicate the extent of the damage. I was angry because my laptop was in there, but he told me it still was, which was a bit surprising, but I love pleasant surprises. After all, my car is fine and my laptop is still there.
I asked where it was, and he told me, so I told him I’d go pick it up (I thought it was still ok at that point,) and he said that was fine. I got there to find the police had a “hold” on the car, and that I couldn’t even see it.
I then got a call to find out the police were out my house accusing my domestic partner of stealing the car. She doesn’t drive and certainly can’t handle a stick, so they decided it was me who did it, even though I wasn’t even in the county at the time. Why the hell would I steal my own car?
They threatened her in front of our children saying that even if it was taken by someone we knew without our permission, if she signed the police report, she’d be arrested and the kids taken to CPS. They had an eye-witness to the crash (did I mention the car had been driven through a brick wall and totaled?) as well as security footage where the car was wrecked, and where it was dropped a short distance later.
I said, “thank God, you’ve at least got a lead.” They then told me that MY picture was being floated among the suspects, even though there were no suspects but me. That’s a strange jeopardy position considering I later got to see the car, and there’s little chance in hell the driver got away without serious injury.
I got a ride back and met with the police myself, who told me to confess I’d stolen my own car. They presented me with very different forms from what they’d showed for signature before I arrived, but I wasn’t about to confess to some crime I hadn’t committed or bow to these ridiculous pressures for something I wouldn’t and couldn’t have done if I wanted. They said the fact that my garbage was in the car, and that my laptop wasn’t stolen proved it was me at the wheel… um, my garbage is always in my car, and whoever crashed it was obviously more interested in a hasty getaway than any addition thievery.
The front windshield had been bashed in by part of the brick wall. Not only was my face not destroyed, but the police officer decided to leave the laptop in the rain when it was impounded, thus destroying my $1,000 Dell (it was $2,200 new, but $1,000 to replace.)
I signed the police report and he removed the hold on the vehicle. I asked if he’d already taken prints off the back hatch, the obvious point of entry since it didn’t lock, and he said he hadn’t, but it didn’t matter… the fingerprints of the thief were right there, and he didn’t even care.
I paid $1,156 to get my totaled car out of impound from those usury fellows at Mary’s towing, even though it was on their lot for less than 12-hours when I got it back, ruined laptop and all.
The point of this isn’t to say that Mary’s Towing takes undue advantage of people who have their cars stolen (though they do) nor that Mill Creek Police Department treat every victim like a criminal (though that also seems perfectly true,) but that if you live at Heatherwood Apartments, you are automatically the criminal in their eyes.
I had always been the first (and often the only) to cooperate with police investigations in the complex (even though it had only been a few weeks) but after that, we decided we would never call them, never cooperate with them, and never call them no matter how bad things got, no matter what was stolen, no matter how dangerous our lives may become. If the police automatically assume that the person making the call is the criminal, you’ve already lost your battle, and everyone at Heatherwood, at least according to Mill Creek police, is already a trouble-maker.
Tags: cars, crime, criminals, grand theft auto, guilt, guilty, police, theft, towing