By the time I had enough money to attend college I had left behind my trailer park peasant roots and now owned an eight room house, a rental property, a 50 per cent share in a small business, and I worked full time delivering Dominos Pizzas. One evening after a day of university classes and an evening of delivering pizzas, when I came home my girlfriend Leilani had prepared a late dinner. She asked me to drive around the block to the soda machine in front of the Laundromat and buy a couple cans of Sprite.
Lewistown is a small town nestled into a valley in the Appalachian Mountains. Sometimes on a clear night there is a stillness that covers the valley and gives one of feeling of secretive solitude. This was one of those nights. I pulled into the laundromat parking lot and turned off the car, I walked over and bought the two sodas and was returning to my car when a police car came screeching into the parking lot at a high speed. Just as I was getting behind the wheel of my car two officer’s rushed over to me and began shouting questions.
“What are you doing?” the first officer shouted angrily.
Buying some soda I answered nonchalantly. For years I have had good relations with the local police and had no reason to feel antagonism towards them or from them.
“Why are you driving with your headlights off?” he screamed.
I tried to answer that I didn’t know that I was doing so, but before I could reply he continued to bellow more questions into my face.
As he shouted in a manner that seemed irrational it became clear his questions were intended to intimidate rather than to gain information.
One officer, whose badge read Robert Brackney seemed to be doing all the shouting and the other officer, a William Benson, stood back from the action. My first impression was that the officers were using me as a way to have a little excitement, as police work in a small town can be pretty quiet and boring.
Officer Brackney continued his over-the-top interrogation with an inflated air of machismo as if I were a dangerous criminal and he was a heroic Rambo, forced to go above the law to rid the world of evil. Through it all I tried to remain cool and collected and respond with a calm, respectful tone of voice.
I was not drinking, I did not use drugs, I was just a citizen who apparently forgot to turn on his headlights so I saw no reason for the abusive behavior. I never once gave him any argument concerning the headlights issue. I sat in the car seat and they looked down on from the window. As he continued his torrent of abuse I finally became exasperated and whispered under my breath, “fuck you.”
This seemed to be just what he was waiting for.
“What did you say.” he shrieked.
“I said fuck you,” I replied with an even voice.
“Now you’re gonna to get it,” officer Brackney shouted as they pulled me out and threw me against the car, and cuffed my hands behind my back. For good measure they kicked my feet out from under me, knocking me unto the ground with a hard thud. Without the use of my hands to cushion the fall my chest and face slammed again the parking lot macadam.
Police have very precise procedures that they must follow that are designed to protect the public. Many police also know how to twist those procedures in order to inflict pain on those in their custody. Operating in this manner gives them added protection because they can simply say, “I was just following procedures,” when accusations of abuse are made. In short order, I was the recipient of two such abuses of procedure.
First, when they walked me to car, procedure called for them to guide me by holding the chain between the two cuffs behind my back. The cruel twist is that if you pull up on those cuffs just a bit you can inflict a great deal of pain, since the arms just don’t bend in that direction.
When the individual in custody is placed in the police car, procedure dictates that the officer should place his hand on the head of the accused so he will not bump it on the roof of the police vehicle. This procedure provides a wonderful opportunity to push the head of the accused downward, twisting the neck at odd and painful angles. I can attest that the officers had these procedural twists down pat and applied them with sadistic precision.
As they had completely bypassed reading me my Miranda rights, once in the car I protested, “This is the United States, I have rights.”
“You just lost your rights,” Brackney snickered.
The arrest happened to be taking place during the trial of the police officers who savagely beat Rodney King in California. When I reminded them that there were laws governing police actions Brackney sneered, “Rodney Kind got what he deserved!”
As we drove towards the police station I began to glean the dynamic between the two officer that likely lead to my unfortunately situation. It seems officer Benson was a rookie, and officer Brackney was in charge of showing him the ropes. To that end, he was engaged in a bit of showing off for his underling, leading to his irrational and unprofessional behavior.
Like most schoolyard bullies, Officer Brackney appeared to be a man who felt small and insecure inside and to compensate he puffed himself up, physically by bulking up his body with weight lifting, and psychologically by using his uniform to find people he could degrade and abuse.
There is little that is more dangerous then a weak ego in a uniform. When we look back over the history of mankind, we can only guess at how many of humanity’s greatest cruelties were perpetuated by such weak men in uniforms.
When we arrived at the police station the place was dark and empty. They sat me in a chair in the middle of the room with my hands still cuffed behind my back. It looked like a torture and interrogation scene from a 2nd rate spy movie. Quickly it began to dawn on me that I could be in real trouble here. They could essentially do whatever they wanted to me and easily cover their tracks.
I was trapped and bound like a criminal and in the hands of a couple small-time sadists whose authority had been challenged. They crept around the outskirts of the room looking at paperwork and whispering to each other. Occasionally hurling insults at me for good measure.
“You’re scum, you’re the same as any rapist or murderer,” Brackney snarled.
A chill came over me as I craned my neck to look around the room in hopes of seeing another witness who might stand in the way of whatever the officers might have planned. I contorted my neck like Linda Blair only to find that each hallway, every window, and every doorway was dark and empty.
“You’re garbage! You have no rights,” Brackney continued.
Until one experiences it firsthand, it is hard to understand how losing your free will degrades your self-esteem. I was essentially kidnapped by a couple of small-town jokers with limited intelligence and questionable morals, yet because they wore a uniform they were unleashed on society.
As I sat in my bondage Brackney’s words echoed in my ears, “Rodney King got what he deserved.”
The situation was completely surreal and I was helpless to defend my self. I began to truly fear what might come next. To be treated like an animal, to be held in bondage by another person, especially when sanctioned by the state, has a profoundly devastating psychological effect. One’s spirit shrivels and your confidence evaporates.
As my mind raced in fear, cataloging the possibilities of what my fate might be, and searching for some way to escape, I began to understand that the horrible feelings I was experiencing inside were worse than any physical abuse they might inflict. In fact, physical abuse seemed preferable to the spiritual degradation their terror was causing. With this in mind I decided to respond to their verbal abuse wit the only weapon I had – my own voice.
“You guys give the police force a bad name,” I taunted them.
They looked at me surprised and annoyed, but went about their business. Realizing how good it felt to stand up for myself I began to lecture them on their duties as police officers, on the U.S. constitution, and on morality. I noticed that the more I pushed them, the more uncomfortable they seemed to get.
“You guys might be happier working in Cuba or China,” I mocked.
“Your behavior would fit right in.”
As I went on I became more aggressive. When Brackney left the room I looked Benson in the eye and said, “I bet he’s fucking you up the ass, isn’t he?”
Benson looked not only shocked, but also frightened. When Brackney returned I continued my tirade. Relishing that the more abusive and foulmouthed I became, the more unnerved they became. Benson whispered to Brackney in a worried voice, “What’s wrong with him? Is he crazy?”
Finally Brackney came up behind me and took the cuffs off my wrists. They both took a position on two chairs a few yards in front of me.
“Listen, we’re gonna give you a break,” Brackney explained. “Call someone for a ride home. You can go. We’ll just forget the whole thing.”
It seemed clear to me that they had made a mistake and had overstepped their boundaries. Thinking I had them in a bind and wanting them to be accountable for their behavior I demanded, “You started this, now finish it. Arrest me.”
The two officers looked at each other with confused expressions. Then stared at me for a long pause. “I just said you can go,” Backney repeated.
“Arrest me,” I demanded.
With weary movements they raised themselves from their chairs and completed their paperwork. The judge had to be summoned to come into court after hours to arraign me. At every step of the way I expected someone would put a stop to the nonsense and put the officers on the carpet for their behavior. How naïve I was.
I was transferred from the courthouse to the jail. Inside the jailhouse office I sat in a chair while three guards filled out paperwork. The guards at the county jail tended to be a particular type of character. Usually they were holdouts from the 1950’s who had pork chop sideburns and drove worn out hot-rods. Most got their start by listening to CB radios scanners and when they heard a fire or police report, even though the held no position of authority, they would put blue bubble lights atop their rusted hot rods and rush to the scene. A friend of mine on the local police force told me the police hated they guys because they were always getting in the way of the real work.
Usually these guys were too overweight or too dimwitted to get on the police force, but were desperate to feel some sense of authority. A rampant condition in small towns. Luckily for them, to be a guard at the county lock-up only required a high school diploma, giving this gang of Fonzi wannna-bes a perfect opportunity to be in a position to lord it over some other unlucky sods.
As a matter of course these three insulted and belittled me as they processed their paperwork. Eventually one of them threw a piece of paper in front of me and told me to sign it. When I began to read it one of the guards ran towards me and bellowed, “I said sign it, not read it!”
By this point the situation had become so surreal and the players so pathetic that I had enough. I leaned back in my chair as if sunning in an easy chair on the beach and flipped my pencil up into the air. It seemed to float slowly towards the ceiling while spinning in circles. At first the three seemed to be in absolutely shock. Once they were able to gather their somewhat limited wits about them, they went ballistic.
The other two rushed towards me, “OK, wise guy, we’re gonna make things rough on ya now!”
They took me to a tiny room and made me strip naked. One got on his knees and looked underneath my balls. They made me bend over and spread my ass cheeks apart while the inspector bent down low to make sure I didn’t have a crate of dynamite hidden up there.
They seemed to take a perverse glee in all this. They were definitely finding homosexual excitement in degrading me in this way. It reeked of the same mixture of sado-sexual perversion one got a sense of in the photos from Abu Ghraib prison.
When they finally took me to the cell they refused to give me a pillow, blanket, toilet paper, or return my shoes. The cell was a tiny cubicle just large enough to hold a cot and a stainless steel toilet with no seat. There was one small slit of a window that was too high up to look out of.
All night I seethed with anger at being put in a cage. In the morning I could only think of the film shoot I was scheduled to direct at that hour, and of that when evening came I would be missing a day of work. And why all this? The police were so bored that they managed to created a criminal were one didn’t exist.
One of the worst things about being in jail was trying to keep your mind from racing. Around noon a book cart came by my cell that represented the extent of the jailhouse library. The reading selection ranged from Dick and Jane level reading material to outdated issues of the Reader’s Digest magazine. All of it too inane to hold one’s attention.
In the afternoon we were allowed out in the yard for an hour. The other convicts ran in circles around the yard to burn off energy. I was not allowed to see a lawyer or have a notebook and pencil. In the evening they brought a cup for of green liquid and told me to go into the shower and rub it over myself from head to toe because the had to ‘delouse me.’
That evening I was released on $1,500 bail. An exorbitant amount for a public nuisance charge. As I headed out the door they returned my shoes with the strings tied together in a tangle of 20 knots. Just a little goodbye gift from the guards.
Two weeks later I was finally able to see the public defender. His first action was to tell me he hoped I had learned a lesson. When your own lawyer assumes you are guilty before he even meets you, you know justice is not in the game plan. By this time I was so dispirited that I signed anything they wanted and plead guilty to any charges they asked. Anything as long as I could maintain the freedom to live my life.
Although I didn’t tell the public defender this, I had learned a lesson. I had learned that there is corruption at every level of authority, and that the justice system will protect its own rather than uphold the law. I learned the depth of fear and despair one feels when the liberties that Americans hold so dear, are trampled into the ground by those in power. But most important, I learned that if you question the authority of those in power, it shakes them to the core. They react like frightened animals trapped in a corner, and will do anything it takes to restore their sense of unquestioned dominance.
A few days later I was speaking to a friend of mine who was a civics professor at the Penn State University. She urged me to file an official complain against the authorities. I knew it was the right thing to do. The truth is I was afraid that if I made trouble the corrupt elements would make my life rough for me, and being locked in a cage had made a strong impression on me, now all I wanted was to live in freedom.
A couple of weeks later I was walking across a bridge that overlooks the Susquahanna River. At the end was a monument to the local men who had died in World War II. As I read the names of those who had given their lives for our country and its ideals I felt ashamed. In the end I lacked the courage to stand up for those same ideals of liberty and justice.
When I got home I wrote a letter of complaint detailing my experience with the police and sent it to the two local newspapers and to the state senator’s offices. Both newspapers refused to print the letter. Years later the owner of the smaller weekly newspaper the County Observer came backstage at an Imperial Orgy performance and apologized.
“I felt for you,” he intoned. “I wish I could’ve helped, but there are people around here I can’t get on the wrong side of.”
The main newspaper, The Lewistown Sentinal, told me they would look into the matter and print a story, but never did. When you have no money, no power, and no voice, the media is the only hope the public has to tell their story in hopes of finding justice. When the media turns its back on the public, and when public officials are above criticism, it is a chilling sign of authoritarian control.
The one man who did stand up was a state senator by the name of Daniel F. Clark. Clark filed a complaint against the police officers and the sheriff’s office on my behalf. I didn’t realize it at the time, but now the war was on and I was a marked man. I had caused them to be called to account for their behavior by a legitimate source of power, and everyone in the local and state police force, the local politicians, the sheriff’s department, and the justice system were on alert and had aligned their defenses. I had crossed the line and must be put back in my place.
As I say, at the time I was completely unaware of what was taking place behind the scenes. I lead a quiet life as far as Lewistown was concerned. My days were filled with college classes in another town, and my evenings filled with work at the pizza shop. I didn’t drink much and rarely went out in public. I really had no contact with the police or other local authorities. But soon a turn of events would give the police a perfect foil that would allow them to place me in their grips.
After a few years my relationship with Leilani suddenly began to fall apart. She was half Hawaiian and came from a troubled home.
Although her stability was always a tad shaky, except that she couldn’t seem to go for more than a few hours without sucking down a joint, she had held herself together pretty well. Once my time was taken up by college and work, she became lonely and soon began to drink and take harder drugs.
When we split she went straight into the arms of a good-looking thug named Robert Murdoch who had just gotten released from prison for brutally assaulting a young woman. He looked a bit like a Robert De Niro in the movie Cape Fear.
Whenever possible Lealani tried to find ways to force a confrontation between Murdoch and I. On a May evening Leilani called and demanded that I give her a painting I had of the Hindu God Krishna. She was welcome to take the painting, but I had lent it out to a mutual friend to use as set decoration on a student film shoot. Even though she knew the painting was not there she said she was coming over to get it.
I had friends over that night and didn’t want to have them entangled in a scene, so when I heard Lealani and Murdoch pull up in front of my house I waited for them outside the front door. As soon as Leilani came near she began punching and scratching my face and chest. She tore my T-shirt off my body before I could subdue her. Murdoch stood a few feet away making threats and saying he would, “break me in two.”
When they refused to leave I called the police for protection and to force Murdoch off my property. The police refused to come. They said it was a personal dispute and they could not get involved. Although I didn’t understand what was going on, this was the first sign that the authorities were aligned against me and were simply waiting for a chance to knock me off my high horse.
After about an hour of drama that took place with the entire neighborhood watching, they finally left, but only after I threatened Murdoch with a baseball bat that a neighbor had handed to me.
Later that evening after my guests had left I called Leilani to tell her she could have the painting as soon as it was returned from the film shoot. Unfortunately Murdoch answered the phone. He said, “Watch your back. When you least expect it I’m going to come up behind you and stick I knife in your back.”
After I hung up the phone, about twenty minutes later I got a call from the state police. They said that Murdoch had filed a complaint against me and I would be placed under immediate arrest. They said I could expect a summons for a court date to arrive in the mail. Although the behavior of the police seemed astounding, I still hadn’t put the pieces together to understand what was really taking place.
Not long after that I received news that Leilani had been arrested and jailed on attempted murder charges. It seems that in a drunken rage Murdoch had beaten her up and during the attack she grabbed a meat cleaver and stuck it into his shoulder.
Knowing she had no one in there to help her, I called her mother, who lived in Hawaii so she could arrange bail. The charges were dropped a few weeks later.
The summer months passed by without further incident. Late in September Leilani’s mother called me to tell me that Leilani was having emotional and drug related problems. She said she was too far away to help and ask if I could try to help her. I told her that I had little contact with her and there wasn’t much I cold do.
Later that week I went out for a drink with friends. After one vodka and seven I returned home to find a note on my door from Leilani, saying she need to speak to me about something, and asking if I could come to the diner were she worked as a waitress.
On the way to the diner I noticed her car parked at a convenience store gas station and figured she had gotten off work early. I pulled in to see what she wanted. To my surprise Murdoch was there with her. Immediately an argument ensued. Murdoch said, “I’m going to give you a beating you’ll never forget.”
Then as Leilani and I spoke for a moment he went to a pay phone and called the police. The police must have absolutely rushed to the scene because they arrived in a moment’s notice and immediately arrested me. I couldn’t believe what was taking place. Even though Leilani told them I wasn’t doing anything illegal, they cuffed me and took me away.
These events seemed so irrational that I was left confused and overwhelmed. I ask what I was being charged with and they said public drunkenness. I explained that I had only one drink and requested a breathalyzer test to prove it, but they steadfastly refused.
In court the judge wisely explained that with a charge of public drunkenness it doesn’t matter how much alcohol you have consumed, if a police officer says you are drunk, then you are. A strange bit of logic, but when you’re in a madhouse, you learn not to question such things.
This time there were no insults. No roughing me up for kicks. It was all done by the book. The officers just seemed focused on getting me into the jail as quickly as possible.
I was processed and taken to my cell. This time I was given blankets, pillow, and toilet paper. Everything was done in a professional manner. But there mere fact that I was in jail at all belied that something was out of whack with these proceedings.
The night came and went. After breakfast one of the jail guards pulled me into a silent stairway. He was a large pot bellied man with shaggy hair and a big scruffy moustache.
“I read that letter you wrote,” he said menacingly “So you think us guards aren’t educated enough huh? I’ll have you know I used to be a substitute teacher at every high school in the county.”
I stood smiling slightly. Not uttering a word. Not revealing a single emotion.
“How do you think I did that if I’m not educated?”
He peered at me expectantly. Again I just smiled without response.
Realizing I would not react he ordered to me, “Go back to your cell, we’ll talk later.”
At around noon I was taken down to the sheriff’s private office and told to sit on a chair against the wall. In a nasty bit if nepotism a guard who was a relative of the sheriff’s stood outside the door like a palace sentry. Rising up slowly from his chair the sheriff glared at me.
“I had to fill out a lot of paperwork because of you.”
Again I sat looking straight into his eyes, betraying no emotion in my face. He spoke with a slow, depressed sounding drawl that is common in that part of the country.
“Have you served in the military?” he barked
“No,” I replied.
“Well I have! I don’t ever want to hear you talk about what people in the military think or feel. Do you hear me? Those people who fought and died for this country weren’t fighting for people like you, I can tell you that for sure.” His reference was to a point in my complaint that he clearly misunderstood.
All this was followed by a barrage of insults, threats, bragging, and complaints about how much work I caused for him.
“I could squash a piss ant like you and no one would say a word,” he warned. “The next time you have a complaint against me, you be a man and come say it right to my face, cause now I am going to make things rough for you.”
He hovered above me as I sat in the chair, his face a few inches above my head.
“You can complain to anyone you want, the governor, the president, It won’t effect me,” he shouted.
Clearly he felt untouchable in his little castle of power. In his personal Barney fiefdom he was a king among men. The alpha male. A regular John Wayne who all others feared. But outside that door he was a feebleminded coward with a yellow streak up his back so wide you could drive a Mac truck on it.
I was well aware that his goal was to get me to react so that he had an excuse for he and his country cousin to lay a beating on me. I was completely unimpressed by him and his bluster. There was something comical about his manner. If he ever had the courage to walk down the street in broad daylight I believe his cartoonish demeanor would have elicited muffled laughter from all directions.
He was a relic from another era that never really existed. A phantom of the American dream become delusion. In his youth he must have dreamed of General Patton. Dreamed that he too might lead valiant men into great battles for the good of all mankind. He was a man of order and discipline. Now those ideals had decayed into tools of contempt to unleash his bitterness onto those around him.
He clung to a worldview that comes into being when groups of men are isolated from the outside world. A world where men are men and women and sissy-boys don’t count. He stood for truth, justice and the American way, and he demanded that all others honor those ideals even as he twisted and perverted them to suit his personal needs.
As his stale breath rained down on me, his words flowed like dialogue from a clichéd parody of a drill sergeant in a 1980’s movie comedy. I sat unmoved and without fear. When reality walks off the map into the nether land where the surreal is accepted as gospel truth, then it is a world where I feel firm on my feet. In some odd way I felt that I had the upper hand. In my head I was already plotting the moment when I would call his bluff, and then his true colors would be revealed.
When POWs are captured they often retain their military structure while imprisoned in order to maintain their spiritual strength. So it seemed with this lot. They were a pack of dinosaurs who growled ferociously in order to convince themselves that the world still trembled at their feet, even while the dust and sediment blotted out the last rays of sunshine, heralding their demise.
When he finally accepted that he couldn’t get a rise out of me, he seemed to wilt. With a spent look on his face he wearily wandered back to his desk and ordered the guard to take me back to my cell.
During the evening the inmates were allowed out in the cellblock to watch TV and play board games. The inmates were a rambunctious bunch of white trash hooligans, most of who were incarcerated on drug charges or petty theft. Many of them spent their entire lives in and out of the hoosegow.
Jail is a strange social situation that seems threatening due to endless jailhouse movies. The baddest cat in the cellblock was a guy called Spinner. Spinner was a large lanky fellow who certainly looked as if he’d been in a few scraps in his day. As is always the case with a gang of males, the top dog has a group of minions who stay by his side.
My questionable position in the cellblock was raised when someone recognized me as a member of a punk rock band that many of the inmates had partied with during their younger days.
One of Spinner’s minions came up and said to me, “Hey man, what did you do to piss off the sheriff so bad?”
“What do you mean?” I asked.
“Spinner said that Lauby, he’s the fat fuck who only has his job because he’s the sheriff’s cousin, Lauby came into his cell this morning and told him to rough you up.”
By that I time already felt confident that I was on good terms with Spinner, so I didn’t fear that his order would be carried out, but it was astounding to learn what lengths these people would go to exact revenge on me.
To prove his story he yelled, “He Spinner, didn’t Lauby come into your cell this morning?”
“Yeah, fuck that asshole,” Spinner replied with disdain.
Despite the seriousness of my situation I felt lighthearted. The whole system was mad as a hatter, and run by a mafia of spoiled children to boot. The ones with the badges, robes, and guns, were no better or no worse than the gang of criminals in my cellblock.
Somehow they had managed to get the power and they were clinging to it for dear life. They sure as hell weren’t going to let some smarty-pants street punk take it away from them. I could have been in big trouble by now, if they weren’t little more than a clan of inept clowns. And if they would have found a way to kill me that evening, I would have died laughing at how pathetic they were.
As the social hour continued spirits were high, the inmates found ways to have fun even under the worst of circumstances. It was like recess in bedlam. I settled into to a lively game of scrabble with Spinner and a few of his friends. My cellblock popularity rose considerably when I scored points by using the word ‘tit.”
After that we moved on to a game of Life. The whole ass-backwards affair seemed to be capped by the ridiculous spectacle of sitting down to a nice game if Life with a gang of supposedly hardened criminals. Yes, we got married, had children, bought homes, built careers, made and lost fortunes. It was a hilarious good time.
In the middle of the game someone called out my name, “Pink, you’re outta here.”
I shook hands all around and left, never to return. Although the threats, insults, and antagonism registered as little more than a farce to me at the time, when I had a moment to reflect on the day’s events, I finally began to understand how deadly serious these people were, and how far they would go to get me. Whatever I did next I had to watch my step. And I still had the court date over Murdoch’s charges looming in the future.
Once out of jail I figured that the sheriff’s office had undeniably broken the law when they tried to get an inmate to beat me. I decided this was the point I would take them to task for. My hope was that I could find someone in authority to take up my case before the coming court date.
My first order of business was to call out the sheriff for the fraud that he was. I wrote him a letter challenging him to meet me face to face as he suggested, but this time outside of his office and in neutral territory, and with video cameras keeping a record of the event. I reminded him of his threats and insults and dared him to repeat them in public and in front of the cameras. I told him that if he did not have the courage to face me, then every time he looked into the mirror he would see himself as I see him; as a coward who can not stand behind his own words.
Not surprisingly, he did not accept my challenge, and I received no response to my letter.
I began calling everyone I could think of who might take an interest in my case. I went to see the township supervisors, one of them replied to my story when without a trace of irony he said, “That’s Jay Laub, he’s an elected official. He can do whatever he wants.” Then he turned and walked out of the room, leaving me to scratch my head in wonder.
I tried a variety of legal aid services and government agencies whose jobs were to investigate corrupt public officials. Usually I got the runaround, but a couple of them actually seemed supportive and said they would help me. But in each case, they never carried through, and then refused to take or return my calls. I could only assume that something was happening behind the scenes to stop them from pursuing the charges.
As this process continued the court date with Murdoch crept closer. If I didn’t have someone on my side by that time I might be in real trouble. I went to the D.A.’s office, but he refused to come out of his private office and speak to me. Getting somewhat desperate I returned the next day. The secretary disappeared into his office and returned after a long wait, “D.A. Searer can’t help you with this because he says it is out of his jurisdiction,” she said somewhat embarrassed.
Around that time a tall man in a black trench coat knocked at my front door. He said he was the internal affairs investigator from the state police headquarters, they were finally investigating the charges Senator Clark filed against the original two officers that started this whole mess.
We sat at a large round wooden table in the center of my library. He asked a few standard questions then looked me directly in the eye, “You seem like a pretty level-headed guy. What happened that night?”
The insinuation what that this was all my fault and it was time to explain my actions.
Taking time to reflect I appealed to his sense of reason, “think about this; did they tell you that I never once questioned the ticket for driving without headlights? You have to ask, if I wasn’t contesting the ticket, what was the problem all about?”
“I have to tell you I have investigated your claims and I can’t find a bit of evidence to support them,” he said evenly.
“Did they admit to saying that I had no rights,” I asked with a friendly smile as if we were two sleuths trying to unravel a mystery.
Has sat silently, maintaining a perfect poker face.
“Did they admit to telling me that Rodney King got what he deserved,” I pushed on.
He remained silent.
“If they denied saying those things, then you have two officers who are willing to lie to you, and I think that would concern you.”
He stood up to take his leave. “We’ll send you a letter regarding our decision,” he said as he walked out the door. I felt sure he was annoyed at having to carry out this charade when everyone involved knew that no actions would be taken against the officers.
A few days later a letter arrived from a Captain Raymond J. Mitarnowski informing me that the investigation concluded that the officers acted properly in their handling of this incident and they were within the rules of regulation of the Pennsylvania State Police Force.
I hadn’t expected anything else. Unless their hands were tied the authorities will always protest their own.
In the meantime my search for help was going nowhere and the court date was right around the corner. A few days before the court date I received a late night phone call from Murdoch, the man who made the charges against me that the police were exploiting.
I had little contact with Leilani in recent months, but heard that she was trying to get rid of Murdoch. Murdoch had called to try to blackmail me into not seeing her ever again. It was kind of stupid on his part because I had no plan to, or interest in seeing her, and had started a new relationship many months before.
“Listen,” he whispered on the phone as if he was about to do me a great favor. “The State Police want to get your ass, bad! They want me in court so they can get you into jail and take care of you. But if you swear not to ever see Leilani again I will not show up in court to testify against you.”
As I didn’t plan to see her anyway, I had nothing to lose so I agreed to his terms. Even though, I didn’t really believe he would hold up his end of the bargain. Especially considering he was out on parole and the police had a lot of leverage against him.
What was most revealing about the conversation was that it confirmed that the police had teemed up with a violent ex-convict
in order to get to me.
In a final attempt to find some support before the court date I called the D.A.’s office in the state capital in Harrisburg. An agent got on the phone and asked me to tell my story. As I spoke I heard a series of beeps over the receiver, as if someone was recording the conversation. I assumed it was the state D.A. recording the call for their records. As I began to tell him about the Sheriff’s office trying to get an inmate to beat me, the phone suddenly went dead. I called the D.A. back and with a tone of concern he asked me, “Did you hear those beeps on the phone?”
“Yes,” I answered.
“Do you know why the phone went dead?”
“No,” I responded.
“Those beeps were not caused by anything in my office. Someone has tapped your telephone line and was listening to our conversation. You’d better get it checked out right away,” he warned me.
When I hung up and I called the phone company and asked them to check the line for taps. They informed me they couldn’t find a tap, but it didn’t really matter because if someone was listening they could pull the tap at a moment’s notice and there would be no way to trace it.
Now I was starting to panic. Were these people crazy? Did they really see me as that much of a threat? Their behavior was so irrational that I thought they might be capable of anything. Perhaps they might plant drugs on me to put me in jail for years.
Or perhaps I might actually end up dead. The situation seemed totally out of control.
Among the things the state D.A. told me was that the local D.A. had to help me, it was his job. I returned to D.A. Searer’s office and told his secretary what the state D.A. had said. In what now was becoming a ritual, she disappeared into the D.A.’s office for a long period of time. When she returned she said that if I put my complaint in writing he would look at it.
I went home and did so and hand delivered it back to the office. From then until the day of the court date I called his office each day, but was always told that Mr. Searer was either out of the office or too busy to speak with me.
As the walls seemed to be closing in on me I decided I had to get out of town for my own survival. Lewistown was my hometown and the only place I had ever lived. Moving meant leaving behind my house that I had invested much time and money into remodeling.
It meant leaving behind friends and family.
My new girlfriend found me a small apartment in State College about 35 miles away. Since I was living in an eight-room house and was moving into a three-room apartment I had to unload many prized possessions. Among them a brand new Steinenger piano.
I felt like it as the Wild West and the sheriff had told me the town wasn’t big enough for the both of us. I always new I would leave Lewistown, but I never expected to be run out of town by corrupt officials.
The morning before the court date I met with a lawyer that agreed to take my case for $75. He felt the facts were on my side in the case. At the appointed hour, as I expected Murdoch did not hold up his side of our bargain, and he showed to testify against me.
As the proceedings began the judge made of point of announcing that he had been called in from another district so that there would be no suspicion that the court was prejudiced against me. As if we were foolish enough to think that really made a difference. The fact that he felt compelled to mention it, said it all.
When Murdoch took the stand he immediately got caught in a series of lies.
“Have you ever been at the property owned by Mr. Pink,” my lawyer asked.
“No. I haven’t,” Murdoch lied.
“You’re sure you’ve never been there?” my lawyer asked incredulously.
“No. I haven’t” Murdoch repeated.
“Mr. Murdoch,” my lawyer continued, “Many residents of the neighborhood witnessed you leaving and entering the property during a period when Mr. Pink was out of town on business. Are you sure you’ve never been there?”
“I might have been there once,” he said. Admitting his first count of perjury.
“Now during your stay were you not sharing a bed with Leilani Collinge?” he asked.
“Yes, I was,” Murdoch admitted.
“Where you aware that at that time she was in a relationship with Mr. Pink?”
“Yes. I was,” he confessed.
“Now that you’ve admitted that you have been at the property, on the evening that you made these charges were you not only at the property, but also told Mr. Pink that you would “break him in two?”
Murdoch denied it steadfastly. When he admitted to perjury on the stand it was a Perry Mason moment. In anything other than a kangaroo court it would have resulted in the charges against me being dropped immediately.
When it was all over the judge said, “This is really a case of one man’s word against another’s. In this case I find Mr. Murdoch to be a more credible witness than Mr. Pink, therefore I find the defendant guilty. To prove I’m not a hanging judge I’m going to let you off with just a fine. But if I hear that your are harassing Mr. Murdoch again it will turn out different.”
My lawyer was furious and wanted to appeal the conviction. Understanding what was really at stake I said no, paid the fine, and got the hell out of there. Within a few days I left behind my house and my past.
Life in Lewistown always meant dealing with pressure to conform. There was always an element of society that hated anyone who stood out. Once when I was eighteen a middle aged man chased me down and attacked me because he had seen me wearing one black and one white shoe on a previous occasion. Such behavior was obviously a danger to society and a personal insult to him.
It was the Nietzschian principle at work; the mediocre must destroy those that stand out in order to protect the dominance of the herd. I was often astounded by the violent reaction some people had towards those who don’t conform.
Now it seemed I was being run out of town for having the audacity to believe that individuality and individual liberty were important ideals. It was all totally bizarre, although perhaps a fitting ending to my life there.
As of 2005 Sheriff Laub is still in power. D.A. Searer is now a judge. I can’t find any record of the two officers that started it all. As long as no one questions those in authority, everything goes on as always. If anyone dares to question they may be crushed by an unspoken conspiracy that demands that all in power align against those who question authority in any way. If a crack appears, all are in danger.
