Between April 13 and 20 we members of the Ponoka RCMP detachment found ourselves running around trying to find all of our winter clothing and boots that we’d packed away (apparently) too early. The number of drivers who had apparently packed away their ability to drive in the snow ‘too early’ was much, much higher. When we weren’t busy dealing with our own kit issues and the mayhem on the macadam, we found the time to capture 24 outlaws.
Dorkus Stalematecus . That is the Latin (well, dog-Latin) phrase, I’ve just now coined, which describes a situation where police can lay criminal charges on the basis of a third party complaint and an abundance of evidence at the scene but then also cannot lay criminal charges because the victim and the perpetrator both have more to lose by admitting their roles in the incident. A stalemate or an impasse results. There was one of those this week. Police were dispatched to an assault complaint at a downtown bar. The drunken dummy whose fists were as blunt as his wit (aka: the guy winning the fight) had heard the police approaching and stumbled back into the bar. The one who remained in the parking lot (aka: the loser) was apparently better at running his mouth than running away. So outside the bar, we had the battered big talker. Inside the bar, we found the big sweaty guy who had an impression of the other guy’s face on his knuckles. Ordinarily a slam dunk for the police but not this time. The winner didn’t want to take credit for his decisive victory as it put him in conflict with the terms of his probation. The loser preferred a lessor disgrace and insisted that the police should believe that he had fallen (repeatedly) into a door knob. As the guy in the bar was still welcome there and the blowhard in the parking lot was not ... and since the guy in the parking lot was clearly a danger to himself (what with all of the door knobs between there and his home), he spent the night in cells. That brings me to my next n’r Latin phrase: Semper Doofus.
One of our freeway members has a peculiar investigation underway. His complainant reported that he had inadvertently cut off another driver on the QEII. He claimed that he felt bad about doing this and so he (essentially) invited the driver of that other vehicle to pull off to the shoulder of the highway in order to identify himself, should that other driver wish to report his bad driving to the proper authorities. The other driver walked over to meet our complainant “and for no apparent reason” punched him in the nose ... three times. For his part, the member was satisfied that the complainant had cut off another motorist. He was even willing to believe that the complainant was sorry about doing it. There was ample physical evidence to support the allegation that the complainant was recently on the receiving end of at least three bites of a knuckle sandwich. What did have the member skeptical was the bits in between.
The complainant insisted that it happened that way. He was only able to provide a mediocre vehicle description and a partial licence plate number. Despite the fact that the limited amount of detail in the description he provided was not likely to identify his attacker, he insisted that the other man be charged (if he was identified). He maintained that position, even after he was warned that if their stories didn’t match up in fundamental ways, he too could be facing some charges. Interestingly enough, a database search of registered vehicles with that description and those three licence plate digits yielded only four possible “hits”. That means that the investigator has pretty fair odds for identifying the alleged assailant. You would think that the complainant would have been “thrilled” to learn that police may soon identify his attacker and would be soliciting his version of events. He was not “thrilled” though; “surprised” perhaps, even “mildly uncomfortable” ... stay tuned.
This week a woman called police to report that she had discovered an “unknown fur object, lying behind her car in the alley behind her residence”. It was further described as being a “big, black, furry thing with a long tail”. She wasn’t inclined to investigate any further but hoped that a member might be dispatched; one who was more inclined to do so. A member was dispatched; one who was armed with a brave heart, an inquisitive nature and more importantly a loaded Smith & Wesson, 9mm handgun. That member arrived and discovered the same “big, black, furry thing with a long tail” that the complainant reported. He soldiered forward from the point that the caller had retreated from and in doing so revealed the “big, black, furry thing with a long tail” to be ... just that; a “big, black, furry thing with a long tail” and nothing else. It was a dried out carcass of ‘something’ which had no head and had holes where four legs had once been. It almost looked like a wolf suit that, say, a sheep could wear or a hairy vest with four arm holes. It is very peculiar and whatever it is, it smells like wet donkey. If it’s yours and you want it back ... please come to the office and get it.
If you have information about any unsolved crime or ongoing criminal enterprise, call the Ponoka RCMP at 783-4472. You can also call Crime Stoppers at 1-800-222-TIPS or now leave tips anonymously on-line at www.tipsubmit.com. If this is the kind of environment that you would like to work in, we are hiring. Check us out at www.rcmp-grc.gc.ca or call 1-877-RCMP-GRC for information about the application process.