Shooting at the walls of Heartache-- bang bang

Another New York City moment.

At approximately 3:30 a.m. this morning, our front door buzzer goes off. Stumbling out of bed, I see two police officers. "Excuse me, is this the residence of Kitty, uhhhh, Leh, Loh, Looh?"

"Kitty lives here... Yes," I cautiously replied. I didn't want to be the guy to fink on my wife, you know?

"Your car has been broken into and we have apprended the man who did it. Just to verify, you did not ask him to enter your car and remove your property, yes?" It's three a.m., my head is spinning from a cold I'm fighting and faced with all the double-negatives, I utter some sort of reply that seems to make everything ok. "Would you like to press charges?"

I suppose that is the single scariest moment of the night. How do you press charges against someone over attempted theft of two decorative pillows, a set of jumper cables, a kite and a hackey sack? "I suppose so."

"Why don't you come out, I'll show you the car and we'll get the paperwork started."

Changing into jeans and putting on a jacket, I tell Kitty about the situation and I tell her I'll be back in a few. I arrive at our car, parked just down the street and there are six officers standing around. "Yeah, he cut his finger on a fuckin' file cabinet." "Lost the finger at the first fuckin' knuckle?" "Yeah, it got some sort of fuckin' infection..." "Oh, hey Sarge, this the guy from Colorado?"

They stand around looking at the car and I hear bits and pieces of the story. A transit cop happened to be on the platform for the elevated train directly above our street and he saw the man as he broke the window. He ran down from the platform and caught another officer at the entrance to the station and the two policemen bumped into the guy as he was walking away with the items. The arrest was easy after that.

Sarge asked me if I would come down to the station. They'd photograph everything and I could just take it home immediately rather than make another trip down later. The driver looked like Arnold Voosloo and the music was the best of the eighties. I hop in the back of the cruiser and three red lights and seven minutes later I was at the back entrance of the Police depot at Hoyt-Schermerhorn Station. Sarge brings me around to the front desk where almost magically, the same cops are standing around. "Yeah, he cut his first fuckin'..." "Oh, hey, Sarge." "This is Gurnsey, who made the collar."

"Oh, yeah, Tranist makes the bust of the century..." says Sarge.

"You know, it's Grand Larceny if he steals shit out of a car," says Gurnsey.

"Woh, hold on a second, Gunga-din, you hoping to get some bars out of this? He stole two goddamned pillows. What next, attempted murder?" yells Salvatore, the Desk Sargeant.

"Well, there is dried blood on the screwdriver."

"Oh. So did he cut himself?"

"No."

"Shit. Better send that to the lab."

The conversation goes on and soon a copy of the New York Penal Code is brought out and references are being made. I didn't realize that the drafters of the Code dropped the F-bomb into it as much as they did.

"Hey, did you get to question him further?" asks Gurnsey.

"Nah," Salvatore says, "As soon as he got to the cell, he fell asleep. The guy has been arrested like, a hundred times." He then intones,"The Guilty always sleep."

As I'm identifiying items from the car, there is a sunglasses case from Ann Klein. Confused as to whose it is, I need to call Kitty. I'm led back to a room where Salvatore is enjoying a cigarette. He sees me and his eyes get big. Apparently, I've found the last room in the city where a person can grab a smoke. Wait a second, how can a man that big disappear? "Hey kiddo, do you have a glasses case from Ann Klein?"

"Yeah, I think so," she groggily replies and hangs up.

Wait a second. When did she buy Ann Klein sunglasses? I think two crimes were committed here tonight...

Signing paperwork and packing up took no time at all and soon Voosloo was driving me back to the apartment. The Sarge snapped some pictures of the broken window and I'm supposed to expect a call from the District Attorney today.

All in all, we count ourselves lucky. As Sarge said, "It's rare that we are in the right place at the right time like this. Usually we just take reports and it is gratifying to actually prevent something every once in awhile."