Well, this night didn't win any awards either. But for an entirely different reason...
I was up until 03:00 or so, and I was almost asleep when I heard a knocking at the door.
Jeez, the cops.
Just who you want to have knocking at the door at 03:15 in the morning.
I opened the door and let him in, and he asked me if Matt Daley was here, the guy that drives the merc parked out front.
I must've looked at him askance or something, for he hastened to say that Matt wasn't in trouble, that someone had busted out the window of the car and stole his stereo.
I went downstairs and woke Matt, telling him at first only that the cops were here and wanted to talk to him. After he was somewhat awake, I told him why they were here. He said good... he couldn't think of any felonies that he'd committed lately....
It turns out that they had caught the guys before they knew that there had been a car burglary... they stopped them for not having a tag on their car, and noticed a ripped-out stereo in the back seat. Or under the front seat, two different stories there.
Not that it matters, of course.
Anyway, they'd been doing traffic on 21st street, and a car went by with one light out, and another went by in the other direction without a tag. The other cop wanted to get the guy with one light out, but reason prevailed and they chased and stopped the one without the tag.
Well, so far, they didn't know that a crime had been committed, so one of them held the two guys and the other one decided to roam the neighborhood. By sheer luck, he drove down Indian Trail and saw that Matts window was busted out.
So he wanted to know if Matt would identify the radio, and he could, and he went over to Kims garage to get the book with the serial number in it, then to where they were holding the burglars and their car to ID the radio.
Anyway, Matts car is a mess... drivers side window busted, the lock was torn out first, I guess, and the dash was pretty well ruined. A bunch of money to fix it all, and those assholes would've gotten maybe $20 for the CD player/radio.
But anyhoo, they caught them, and they might even spend some time in the pokey. The cop said that he'd had contact with them before, on suspicion of similar activity, but he didn't say if they'd been convicted or not. Being a very vengeful person right now, I'd like to see them off of the streets permanently. We do have a three strikes and yer out! law here.
We've had our vehicles broken into numerous times since we've lived here, and at least once, before Karen and I got married, someone went into the garage and took a bunch of stuff out of a vehicle. Not too long ago, Tyler came up from Texas with JDs computer and monitor so that I could fix it. He arrived late at night, and left the stuff in his truck; it was gone the next morning, window busted out, of course. I can't remember if they got his stereo of not, though...
And most of the break ins in the neighborhood occurred when there was a black family with a teenager living down the block in a rental. Most of his friends were white, though, and I don't really know if it was him for sure... but the infractions stopped when they moved.
So anyway... when I get woke up right before I go to sleep, I can't go to sleep. I was right on the verge in that hypnotic state when the cop knocked on the door. So I've been up about 24 hours or so, and I'm ready for some sleep now.
Then they had to hold the radio as evidence; until the first of the year, when a new DA was sworn in, all they had to do was take pictures and give the property back... now they have to hold it. The cop told Matt to call the DAs office and raise hell about that, especially since he had the serial number and everything.
Did I mention that they were assholes? And black, natch. Dammit, that sounds racist or something, but I'm not a racist... most of the crime in this town is committed by young black guys. That's a fact, and I wish that it wasn't.