Police Beat: A day drinker, a police impersonator and stolen tools
Editor’s note: Compiled from reports to Tacoma police and the Pierce County Sheriff’s Department.
Feb. 20: The drunken man insisted the time was 3 a.m. He couldn’t understand why the sun was shining. It had to be a conspiracy.
The dispatch call reported a collision at a car dealership. Two sheriff’s deputies drove to the 10000 block of Pacific Avenue South.
They spoke to a man driving a 2018 Nissan Rogue. The man said another car, a 2011 Chevrolet Aveo, pulled into the lot and banged into the Nissan. An older man stepped out of the car and refused to exchange information.
The first man said he took the keys out of the Chevy because the man appeared to be drunk.
The deputies looked at the two cars and saw fresh damage. They walked into the dealership and found a man, 72, shouting at employees. He turned his ire on the deputies.
Everyone was scamming him, the man said. Everyone was in on it.
The deputies told the man to calm down. He kept telling them to look at the clock on the wall and tell him what time it was. The deputies replied repeatedly: It was 3 p.m.
The man said that couldn’t be right. It had to be 3 a.m. Everyone was lying to him. The deputies were perjuring themselves.
The man smelled like liquor. One deputy asked if he’d been drinking. The man said the deputies were liars, part of the scam.
One deputy asked for the man’s license and registration. The man said it was in the Chevy. The deputies checked. They found a half-empty bottle of rum.
The deputy told the man he was under arrest. He kept shouting about the scam. He refused to take a breath test. The deputy headed for the South Hill precinct, where she intended to take a blood sample.
On the way, the man kept asking for the time. The deputy gave it. The man said it made no sense. He couldn’t be that far off.
“If it’s 3:30 in the afternoon, you’re saying I’ve been drinking all day,” the man said.
The deputy asked a question.
What was more likely? That the man was mistaken about the time, or that three deputies, four emergency medical technicians and four other witnesses were lying?
The man calmed down. He stopped ranting and apologized. He signed the DUI citation and thanked the deputy for being patient with him. She drove him home and handed him his paperwork.
Feb. 16: When you hear a cop on the phone, it might make a little sense to pull a bravado move and question his credentials.
However, calling back and pretending to be a cop yourself might be unwise.
The dispatch call reported a disturbance at a Tacoma coffee shop. A young man wearing a dark shirt, camouflage shorts and a wire wrapped around his waist was harassing customers and following female employees as they left the business.
Two officers drove to the 3900 block of 6th Avenue and spoke to the business owner, who said the stranger had just left — but he was calling and making threats.
The owner handed the phone to an officer, who identified himself. The man on the line said he didn’t believe it.
He claimed to be an executive from Starbucks. He demanded to speak to the owner.
The officer told the man to stop calling. He asked for the man’s name. The man refused to give it. The officer told the man to come back to the business and give his side of the story.
“I will be back,” the man said. “You don’t know who you’re messing with.”
The officer told the man to stop making threats. He identified himself again, giving a name and badge number. He told the man not to return to the shop and hung up.
The phone rang almost instantly. The man continued his rants at the business.
Officers heard swift breathing. They guessed the man was walking nearby. They searched the area, but didn’t see him and returned to the shop.
The owner was on the phone again. He said he had told the man that Tacoma police officers were at the shop. The man had replied that he was “Officer Johnson of the Tacoma Police Department” and would handle the call himself.
The officers started searching again. This time they had a fresh tip from a witness who had seen a man matching the suspect’s description walking nearby.
Soon, the officers spotted the man. He wore a dark shirt, camouflage shorts and had a metal cable wrapped around his waist. After a short struggle, he was cuffed and placed in a patrol car.
The man, 22, said he had been waiting for his coffee when the owner told him to leave. He said he called the shop afterward because he was angry.
Why did he keep calling after talking to a police officer who told him to stop?
“You sounded like a poser,” the man said.
Why did he pretend to be a police officer?
Again, the man said he was angry.
Officers brought the man to the coffee shop. The owner took a look at him and said that was the guy. He said the man had loitered in the shop for two hours, staring at employees and customers.
Officers told the man he was under arrest. They warned that he was banned from the shop and could be arrested again if he returned. They booked him into the Pierce County Jail on suspicion of misdemeanor harassment, telephone harassment and impersonating a police officer.
Feb. 17: The tools lying around the empty house weren’t free, but the woman saw an opportunity.
The dispatch call reported a burglary in progress. A sheriff’s deputy drove to a home in the 10500 block of Wright Bliss Road Northwest, near Gig Harbor.
He found the man who had called 911, sitting in a truck and blocking the path of a white Chevrolet Cavalier that sat in the driveway. A woman stood next to it, rummaging through the back seat.
What was she doing?
The woman, 52, said she was looking at the house to see if it was for sale.
The man in the truck said he had arrived earlier to do some remodeling work for a friend. He saw the woman carrying tools and light fixtures and putting them in her car. The stuff didn’t belong to her.
The deputy cuffed the woman and read her rights. She said she understood.
Did she take tools from the house?
The woman said yes. She said she thought the house was in foreclosure, so it wouldn’t matter.
Why did she take them?
“I just lost my husband and house and I have nothing,” she said. “I was hoping to use the stuff at my next place.”
The deputy booked the woman into the Pierce County Jail on suspicion of residential burglary.
This story was originally published February 23, 2019 at 1:30 PM.
.JPG)