Police reports serve a useful
purpose. They inform the prosecutor of
the conduct that is to be charged. They
inform the judge and defendant (and occasionally the grand jury) of what the police
said happened, so that the defendant can know, exactly, what they have to deny.
They let the defense know if the complained of conduct fits the elements of the
criminal code.
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| Melissa Valencia, after coming down |
Most police reports are pretty
stodgy affairs that read like recipes for cornbread. However, occasionally there comes along an
officer more prone to Jack Kerouac-like prose who clearly is in the wrong
profession. Who was either led astray as
a young man, or has a crime novel in him somewhere. Someone who is destined to become the next
James Ellroy with tight, clipped prose who can describe an entire scene in a
few words that his junior high teacher probably described as a fragment, but
that the world now knows is a sentence, a fully formed thought – damn the
subject, verb, article constraints.
Fayetteville, Arkansas has just
such an officer who was likely waiting for some time to get his chance to
shine. Or Fayetteville is just that kind
of town where this kind of thing happens all the time and a police officer who
is moonlighting in the creative writing program at the University of Arkansas
(or moonlighting on the police force) happens to write an epic report.
Melissa Valencia, 21, provided the
police an opportunity for some Ellroy-esque prose in their police report when
she was reported to be intoxicated, naked and thrashing around a parking
lot. Police tried to pin her down as she
hid behind a pole, unsuccessfully because she’s bigger than a pole. And, because
she was naked and frankly pretty cute.
Then there are police dash-cams
which protect officers from civil rights lawsuits, and some would say save the
public from police misconduct by making sure that all arrests are videotaped.
They also successfully tape naked suspects running across parking lots while
police chase them trying to pin them down.
When it was all over and the
officer had to sum up the experience on paper because you can’t just present
the dash-cam to the grand jury (you do, but you also have to present a report
for a charging instrument), the officer correctly noted that she was “tripping
balls.”
Yep, that about sums it up:
Valencia was tripping balls. Cause plus effect neatly stated. Though, unfortunately
for her, not a defense, as temporary insanity due to voluntarily taking an
intoxicant is not a legal defense.
Valencia, after being wrestled to the ground, covered with a blanket, and
handcuffed and taken to the hospital, was cooperative – having come down from
her high.
She faces charges of “public intoxication,
disorderly conduct and resisting arrest” and possibly public nudity, though
that’s not mentioned in the article, and maybe in Fayetteville, that kind of
thing is not frowned upon if you’re cute and 21 years old. The charges could
have been boiled down to the officer’s original statement. She could have been
charged with “tripping balls.”
Story and picture link: New York Daily News
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