Police beat: An unruly patron, a school brawl and an argument over a truck

Editor’s note: Compiled from reports to Tacoma police.

March 6: The woman refused to leave the country-themed nightclub and swore at staffers who told her it was time to go.

She was 27, shoeless, leaning against a railing near the mechanical bull. The staff had cut her off an hour earlier. Officers drove to the club in the 1100 block of South Broadway and took charge.

As officers escorted her outside, she turned to one of them, let loose with a soggy curse and said she wasn’t going to leave.

Eventually, officers found a friend who was willing to take the woman home. Before that arrangement could be settled, the woman smacked another bystander in the head. The man said he didn’t want to press charges.

Officers cuffed the woman. She kicked and screamed as they horsed her into a patrol car. They read her her rights. She answered with another curse.

On the way to the Pierce County Jail, the woman kicked at the windows of the car, to no effect. She shouted at the officer behind the wheel, saying, “My daddy will come get me,” and, “Why don’t you let me out so you can see what will happen.”

The woman was booked into the jail on suspicion of criminal trespassing.

March 7: The fight over middle school friendships might have ended peacefully, but then the parents got involved.

Officers responded to the reported fight at Gray Middle School and found three teenagers, two girls and a boy, sitting in offices with various injuries, along with a teacher and a security officer with bumps and bruises of their own.

Sorting out the details took a while, but officers interviewed the staff members, the injured teens and witnesses, and took a look at school security video.

The trouble had started when a 12-year-old girl learned that one of her friends had decided to be friends with a girl the 12-year-old didn’t like. That made the 12-year-old jealous, and she threatened to beat up her friend.

The friend was scared and called her mother, who drove to the school with her two older daughters and demanded an audience with the principal. The daughters were told to wait outside the office. Instead, they waited at the school entrance, hoping to catch the 12-year-old.

They found her and started beating her with their fists. A boy got caught up in the melee and got punched for his pains. Officers viewed the security video, which matched the stories.

An officer tried to interview the mother, 38, who preferred yelling to talking and wouldn’t answer questions. As she argued with the officer, the mother of the boy who had been caught up in the fight arrived and began berating the first mother.

It took two officers to separate the women. The older daughters joined in, and the situation began to escalate again. Eventually, five officers arrived to separate the battling parties.

The confusion ended with the mother cuffed in a patrol car. Officers arrested the two daughters, 17 and 14, and booked them into Remann Hall on suspicion of misdemeanor assault. 　

March 8: The scheme was doomed from the start — trying to avoid an impound after a hit-and-run by reporting a stolen car.

It unraveled at Tacoma Police headquarters, where the car’s owner shouted his way into jail after arguing that he was a taxpayer and officers should be working for him.

The strange sequence began shortly after midnight a day earlier, when officers received a call of a reported hit-and-run in the 5300 block of South Sheridan Avenue. Half an hour later, a second call came in, reporting a carjacking attempt in the same area.

Officers drove to the spot and found the vehicle, a red 2004 Nissan Titan, but no one was around. The truck was impounded.

The following day, two men arrived at police headquarters to complain. One was the truck’s owner, 48. The other was his friend, 33.

The older man was irate. He had loaned the truck to his friend, who had reported it stolen the previous night, he said. Police didn’t come, and then the truck was impounded, which wasn’t fair. Why couldn’t they release it?

An officer tried to interview the friend, but the older man kept interrupting. Eventually, the story changed slightly. The friend said he had reported the carjacking attempt to police, but hidden in nearby bushes when they arrived and impounded the truck.

The older man kept interrupting. The officer kept explaining that the earlier hit-and-run report forced the impound of the truck, regardless of the subsequent theft report.

The older man wasn’t happy with that answer. He was unhappy with the officer’s performance. The officer told the older man to back off and allow the interview with the friend to continue.

The older man wouldn’t stop. He wanted to talk to the police chief. The earlier theft report had been ignored, and police were at fault for that. He was a taxpayer. The officer was giving him excuses.

The older man pressed his case with multiple officers, continued to interfere with the interview and demanded to speak to a supervisor. Meanwhile, other bystanders were waiting for service at the front desk.

Finally, a sergeant came down and took the older man aside. The man said the politicians and police worked for him, and he would call his lawyer.

The sergeant tried to explain that the story of the theft report had holes in it, and police were following department policy. The older man shouted, talking over the sergeant. The sergeant told him to leave the building.

The older man refused. The sergeant said the man was risking arrest.

“I don’t have to leave, and you can’t make me,” the man said.

The sergeant told the man he was under arrest and cuffed him.

“You can’t do this — I’m the victim,” the man said.

The sergeant said shouting at officers, interfering with a police interview and refusing to leave the building justified the arrest.

“My lawyer is going to love this,” the man said.

The older man was booked into the Pierce County Jail on suspicion of criminal trespassing.

This story was originally published March 12, 2016 at 8:21 AM with the headline "Police beat: An unruly patron, a school brawl and an argument over a truck."