Bad cop, good cop

[CShaveRR]

The Mook's latest post about a cop going around the gates left me upset... disregarding signals is one of the easier ways to set me off.

Sooo, as therapy, I thought I'd post a story that appeared yesterday on the UTU web site about a cop who seems to be using the brains he had.

CTA: Can you spot the cop?
CHICAGO -- The Chicago Transit Authority (CTA) recently placed new public-service placards on its buses and trains to reassure customers that mass-transit police -- both uniformed and undercover officers--are watching out for rider safety and security, according to this Chicago Tribune report.
The photo on the placards shows a group of people standing on the Chicago Avenue "L" platform. The headline asks, "Can you spot the undercover cop?"

Benjamin Wlodyka, 21, of Chicago was stumped while riding a Red Line train with friends about 10 p.m. last Wednesday (Feb. 18), police said.

So Wlodyka removed the placard from its holder in the train and started walking down the aisle, pestering fellow passengers about whether they could identify the undercover law-enforcement officer (not his exact words) in the poster.

As he got to the middle of the train, Wlodyka even offered a big hint, allegedly pulling out a Sharpie brand marker, which is the type often used by graffiti vandals to deface transit property, and circling a person on the placard.

He then approached Eddie Perez.

"Hey, I think I know who it is," offered Perez, a sergeant with the Chicago Police Department's mass-transit unit who was off duty, in plain clothes, just riding the train home.

"Yeah, who?" responded Wlodyka.

"Me," Perez answered as he displayed his police badge.

Wlodyka was arrested for damaging the placard. He was charged under CTA President Frank Kruesi's zero-tolerance policy with criminal defacing of public property, vandalism and possession of marking or etching materials with intent to use them for criminal purposes.

"It was a classic moment," Perez later said.

(The preceding report was published by the Chicago Tribune Monday, Feb. 23, 2004.)

February 23, 2004

[mudchicken]

That beats the tagger at GEMCO/Burbank, CA who stepped back to admire his handiwork on the side of a covered gon and got run over by a Metrolink Commuter Train on the next track over[:D]

Still think taggers ought to be eliminated like any other vermin with a bounty on their heads.....[}:)]


[banghead][banghead][banghead]

[Anonymous]

Hey Mudchicken , How about we find a semophore & atatch a noose to the arms in the lowered position, Add a tagger & wait for the trains to come along, That'll probably be a cure all for the taggers blues.

[Anonymous]

As Homer Simpson once said.... Doh!!

[Anonymous]

I have never had a bad experience with railroad police. Now the city police or the highway patrol is a different story.

[Anonymous]

LOL, good story CShave...

LC

[Mookie]

A red star to both Brother Carl and the Chicken! I know the police are human - but they seem to be getting a little lax in their following the laws, while being charged with enforcing those laws. (My incident took place just a few blocks from our city police department)

[rrnut282]

I liked these stories, they have a happy ending.[}:)]

[cherokee woman]

QUOTE: Originally posted by CShaveRR

The Mook's latest post about a cop going around the gates left me upset... disregarding signals is one of the easier ways to set me off.

Sooo, as therapy, I thought I'd post a story that appeared yesterday on the UTU web site about a cop who seems to be using the brains he had.

CTA: Can you spot the cop?
CHICAGO -- The Chicago Transit Authority (CTA) recently placed new public-service placards on its buses and trains to reassure customers that mass-transit police -- both uniformed and undercover officers--are watching out for rider safety and security, according to this Chicago Tribune report.
The photo on the placards shows a group of people standing on the Chicago Avenue "L" platform. The headline asks, "Can you spot the undercover cop?"

Benjamin Wlodyka, 21, of Chicago was stumped while riding a Red Line train with friends about 10 p.m. last Wednesday (Feb. 18), police said.

So Wlodyka removed the placard from its holder in the train and started walking down the aisle, pestering fellow passengers about whether they could identify the undercover law-enforcement officer (not his exact words) in the poster.

As he got to the middle of the train, Wlodyka even offered a big hint, allegedly pulling out a Sharpie brand marker, which is the type often used by graffiti vandals to deface transit property, and circling a person on the placard.

He then approached Eddie Perez.

"Hey, I think I know who it is," offered Perez, a sergeant with the Chicago Police Department's mass-transit unit who was off duty, in plain clothes, just riding the train home.

"Yeah, who?" responded Wlodyka.

"Me," Perez answered as he displayed his police badge.

Wlodyka was arrested for damaging the placard. He was charged under CTA President Frank Kruesi's zero-tolerance policy with criminal defacing of public property, vandalism and possession of marking or etching materials with intent to use them for criminal purposes.

"It was a classic moment," Perez later said.

(The preceding report was published by the Chicago Tribune Monday, Feb. 23, 2004.)

February 23, 2004

That reminds me of a story Walt has told me about an ambulance run he was on one day.
They had picked up this lady's husband from their home to take to the hospital. The couple lived on a one-way street, and there was a railroad crossing.

The gates were apparently malfunctioning, because there wasn't a train anywhere around. The man's wife asked Walt if he wanted her to get out of the ambulance and hold the gate up so he could go through. Walt told her no, that he would turn on the siren
and go the wrong way on the one-way street.

[Anonymous]

Just as I climb into a patrol car and say I have seen everything, someone comes along to show me something new. CShaver's story reminds me of the bit in Monty Python's "Life of Brian" where Brian is busily dabbing "Romans Go Home" in grammatically incorrect Latin. A Roman patrol walks up behind him and the centurion spends a good five minutes correcting Brian's Latin, then tells him to write it 100 times by morning or the centurion will, ah, castrate him. Brian does so and becomes a hero in the PJF (People's Jewish Front).
I haven't done that- yet- in a rural Alabama county there aren't many walls to tag, and the trains all seem to be moving too fast to tag them, either.