In Which RTT Gets Profiled
Feb. 22nd, 2012 10:04 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
mallorys_cameraSo RTT got brutalized by the Ithaca police night before last. He was cutting through DeWitt Park around 11pm, on his way to the movie theater where B works – it was a Trumansburg night. The cops grabbed him, searched him, slammed him up against the wall and began interrogating him. Probably cause: There’s a curfew in DeWitt Park. Actual cause: Some tourists were robbed at knifepoint by two teenagers earlier that day, a black kid and a white kid.
Justin who’s black is Jonathan to RTT’s David, and I personally think the cops have had Justin’s house under surveillance since his brother got into trouble.
I heard about all this secondhand through B.
DeWitt Park was the scene of the local Occupy movement, a few scraggley tents and cardboard placards that survived almost through Christmas, thanks to a mild winter and the generally bemused attitude of afore-mentioned cops. Indeed, I’ve always found the Ithaca police to be extremely reasonable so far as standing militias go. Faithful readers will remember I dated one for a short while and then there was the time last year when I got a midnight call from RTT – Come pick me up in Ithaca or I’ll have to sleep in a dumpster. I threw a sweater over my pajamas, got in my car and sleep-drove down the hill. On the way, I ran a red light which I was completely oblivious to until I got pulled over.
“I suppose you know why I pulled you over,” the officer said after he’d checked my license and registration.
“Actually, I don’t,” I said.
The officer explained. “There was a car coming straight at you,” he added. “Fortunately it braked just in time, otherwise you’d be waiting for an ambulance right now.”
I sighed and on the remote chance that stone could be moved began to tell the officer the story of just why I was on the road in my pajamas at this time of the night.
He leaned his head through my window, sniffed for alcohol, and then let me go with a stern lecture but without a ticket which I thought was damn nice of him.
Cops last night were not so nice. I suppose the people who got robbed were New York State teachers who hold a convention in Ithaca every February, thereby provide a midwinter pop that local businesses depend upon.
Anyhoo, RTT told the cops he wouldn’t talk to them unless his father was present. At 17 I’m not sure that’s a legal requirement anymore but the cops let him call B who hurried over. He was crying on the phone and still sobbing when B got there, spread-eagled up against the granite façade of the Presbyterian Church. He recovered his bravado on the drive home, B reported.
I actually don’t think he was nabbed randomly. There’s a cop who hangs out in the lobby of the historic Clinton House where RTT’s school is housed. I think they knew Justin and RTT are a team and that Justin and RTT were therefore on the shortlist of probable suspects. Profiling at its crudest.
They took his photograph and his fake ID but didn’t fingerprint him. He was back on the streets partying again last night so no permanent emotional damage done.
I’m outraged, of course.
In other news, I have a shitload of deadlines which have me in a state of total panic plus I’m struggling with the novel once-over – this time from the perspective of what can be cut. Seems to me, for example, that the entire Chapter 3 can be cut since nothing happens in Chapter 3 to advance the story though I do get to show off my big vocabulary and my winsome way with metaphor.
Justin who’s black is Jonathan to RTT’s David, and I personally think the cops have had Justin’s house under surveillance since his brother got into trouble.
I heard about all this secondhand through B.
DeWitt Park was the scene of the local Occupy movement, a few scraggley tents and cardboard placards that survived almost through Christmas, thanks to a mild winter and the generally bemused attitude of afore-mentioned cops. Indeed, I’ve always found the Ithaca police to be extremely reasonable so far as standing militias go. Faithful readers will remember I dated one for a short while and then there was the time last year when I got a midnight call from RTT – Come pick me up in Ithaca or I’ll have to sleep in a dumpster. I threw a sweater over my pajamas, got in my car and sleep-drove down the hill. On the way, I ran a red light which I was completely oblivious to until I got pulled over.
“I suppose you know why I pulled you over,” the officer said after he’d checked my license and registration.
“Actually, I don’t,” I said.
The officer explained. “There was a car coming straight at you,” he added. “Fortunately it braked just in time, otherwise you’d be waiting for an ambulance right now.”
I sighed and on the remote chance that stone could be moved began to tell the officer the story of just why I was on the road in my pajamas at this time of the night.
He leaned his head through my window, sniffed for alcohol, and then let me go with a stern lecture but without a ticket which I thought was damn nice of him.
Cops last night were not so nice. I suppose the people who got robbed were New York State teachers who hold a convention in Ithaca every February, thereby provide a midwinter pop that local businesses depend upon.
Anyhoo, RTT told the cops he wouldn’t talk to them unless his father was present. At 17 I’m not sure that’s a legal requirement anymore but the cops let him call B who hurried over. He was crying on the phone and still sobbing when B got there, spread-eagled up against the granite façade of the Presbyterian Church. He recovered his bravado on the drive home, B reported.
I actually don’t think he was nabbed randomly. There’s a cop who hangs out in the lobby of the historic Clinton House where RTT’s school is housed. I think they knew Justin and RTT are a team and that Justin and RTT were therefore on the shortlist of probable suspects. Profiling at its crudest.
They took his photograph and his fake ID but didn’t fingerprint him. He was back on the streets partying again last night so no permanent emotional damage done.
I’m outraged, of course.
In other news, I have a shitload of deadlines which have me in a state of total panic plus I’m struggling with the novel once-over – this time from the perspective of what can be cut. Seems to me, for example, that the entire Chapter 3 can be cut since nothing happens in Chapter 3 to advance the story though I do get to show off my big vocabulary and my winsome way with metaphor.
