Click here to read part 1 one this series.
The second half of police officers Chris Engle and Heidi Lambley’s Saturday night shift on College Hill included a lost birthday boy, a serenade, a foot pursuit and a stolen tazer.
A little before 1 a.m. Engle and Lambley were stopped by the gnome, now out of costume, they had encountered earlier. At Lambley and Engle’s request, he agreed to a repeat performance.
He sat down with his friend who played the ukulele while he rapped, urging passersby “to go, go, go, because you don’t want a ticket.”
“Why can’t more people be like him?” Lambley said. “He’s always so happy.”
The foot patrol continued. At about 1:15 they had their first MIP citation.
“What did you put behind the tree?” Engle asked a young man who stood on the sidewalk.
He did not answer. Engle walked over and shone his flashlight behind the tree. It was a Busch Light can.
The young man handed over his identification, which showed he was 18 years old and visiting from out of town. He was then put into handcuffs and read his Miranda rights.
His friend began to plead with Lambley and Engle for him to be released.
“Please,” he said. “I’ll do anything.”
Lambley said he should have warned his friend about having an open container of alcohol.
“But he needs to study right now,” his friend said.
Because the 18 year old was cooperative and honest about his age and identification, Engle said he would issue him a citation instead of arresting him.
After the MIP, Engle and Lambley traveled less than half a block before stopping again. Another young man staggered up the sidewalk. He had a black “X” on either hand.
When asked for his identification, he handed Engle an iPod case. After several attempts to figure out his name, he was identified, and it turned out to be his 21st birthday.
“You must have crappy friends if they lose you on your 21st birthday,” Lambley said to him.
The young man did not realize he was missing his phone. He also could not remember the names of his friends or their phone numbers and addresses. However, he did know what city he was in, what year it was, that Obama was the current president and that Mickey Mouse was indeed a mouse, not a cat or dog.
Concerned and unsure of what to do, Lambley asked the birthday boy if he would be willing to go to the police station. She said he would not be charged with anything, but he would be able to lie down and drink some water.
The birthday boy agreed, and another police car came and picked him up.
It was almost 2 a.m.
“We should head back (to Adam’s Mall) for fight night,” Engle said. “Every night is fight night.”
As Stubblefield's closed, a large amount of people gathered outside Adam's mall.
“I need help over here,” DJ Goldfinger’s brother shouted from the patio of Adam’s Mall. He was standing over a young woman laying on the ground.
He alleged that she had assaulted him by kicking him in the groin.
Lambley bent over to talk to the girl, who did not make any effort to stand up for several minutes.
Eventually the young woman stood up, and Lambley handcuffed her, arresting her for fourth degree assault. She began to wail.
“It was self-defense,” she said.
She was put in the backseat of a police car and taken away.
Almost immediately afterward, Lambley found the friends of the lost birthday boy.
“It was his birthday and something bad could have happened to him,” she said to one of them.
She told the birthday boy’s friend to get a cab and go pick him up, but he chose to go home instead.
Nearing the end of their shift, Lambley and Engle went back to their patrol car where they were soon called to aide in the pursuit of a young man. A police officer tried to detain him for a possible alcohol violation and when asked for his identification, he ran.
As the runner jumped over a fence one of his legs caught, and he fell. He bounced back up and kept running. The officer in pursuit also jumped over the fence, fell, got back up and continued the chase.
Engle sped across the corner in the patrol car.
The runner evaded arrest. They realized later that the officer’s tazer had fallen out of his holster during the pursuit and was stolen.
After a long, unsuccessful search for the subject and the missing tazer, Engle and Lambley drove back to the police station.
On the way back, they drove up behind a car that was stopped in the middle of the street.
Engle sighed.
“I’m going to need to you to pull over to the side,” he said to the driver.
Their shift ended with a DUI arrest.
