Don't believe I've ever seen so many paranoid people in one place.
Never been on the wrong side of the questions, have you.
My story...
I had relocated to NW Arkansas in the mid 90s for a job with a small kit plane manufacturer as their engineer. I am out from NY, most of the company came out from CA the year before, this is a very rural area and we all stick out like sore thumbs.
Their is an Air Show that the company is going to attend and I am going to mind the shop. My neighbor, who also moved out with his wife and kids from CA, is attending but has a problem. His wife works night shift at a Tyson chicken plant nearby and doesn't get home till midnight. The boy (14) and girl (11) get home from school around 3 though... No problem. If they can be trusted (the boy is 14) to be home a couple hours alone I will get back by 5:05 (I worked real close). When I get home I get them fed and help with any needed homework. They go to bed and I crash in the recliner with the TV until mom got home around midnight and then go home. This went fine for day Mon and Tues (aside from the Tornado scare... another story). Tues night Lori, the mom, said I could just go home next door when they are asleep. Wed and Thur pas eventually with me going home around 10 or so.
On Friday a deputy sheriff came out to the shop to see me.
He requested I follow him back to their station, using my car, to answer some questions about a problem in the area... I agree and let the shop know I am stepping out and where I am going.
I am taken to an office pretty far back in the station and informed that there have been harassing phone calls made to women in the area over the last couple days... "What do you think of that? What do you think should be done to the person who did that?" and other such questions. I, being a law and order type of guy said my opinions on the matter and that I had not problem helping them find the perpetrator (oh how naive I was...). He then takes out a little tape recorder and says that one of the women recorded the call. It sounded like a kid, not local, saying stupid stuff about how she was pretty and how he would like to kiss her. It was stupid, and probably unsettling, but nothing like how bad I thought it would be. I am then told that several of the women complaining had been called repeatedly, over and over. The recording I was listening to was from a call made to... THE SHERIFF'S WIFE
.
The sheriff at the time was known to administer Slap Glove Justice and was widely rumored to have been responsible for a large portion of the pot harvest in the hills around there, ruthlessly going after any who would illegally grow such crops without his protection. He really did have "Love" and "Hate" tattooed on his knuckles.
Now the Deputy says "I know that is you on that tape."
!!! The calls were traced to the house I was sitting at.
!!!! He then leads me through a door in the side of the office to a room with only a table, two chairs and a clock. It is all painted cinder block construction with a heavy solid door. It is on the other side from an empty office which is at the end of an empty hallway. I am getting very nervous. I am left to stew for about 10 minutes.
When he returns he starts putting on the pressure. If I would simply sign this statement confessing this could all be handled quickly. His boss wants this done today and he is going to get it done. They know it is me so it would be easier on everyone if I just signed. They could have a voice analysis done but why waste the time when they already know the answer... I ask about the kid I was watching and am told he is off on a school trip and they have not spoken to him but they spoke to his mom who said I was at the house during the times in question. I continue to state that I am not certain who that is on the tape but it is a kid or two and one is certainly not local. I, being from NY, have an accent not similar to the region and over a fuzzy recording perhaps they think my voice from my 5'4" frame with a NY accent sounds like this kid but it isn't. I am not signing anything and if I am being placed under arrest, which he states I am not at the moment, I am going to need a lawyer. All the while I was really expecting my head to get bounced off the table but I know one thing, I am not signing a damn thing. The fear of actual physical abuse, and lack of witnesses or recording made me hesitant to get to demanding on the lawyer issue. The whole time I try to be as polite and non-confrontational as possible. Now open physical threats are made but the outrage of the sheriff is mentioned over and over and how it will go much harder for me if I don't cooperate. I am then left there again after a good 20 - 30 minutes back and forth suggesting I sign a confession.
When the deputy returned he asked me what I wanted to do. I replied "I have no problem helping you but I am not signing or admitting to anything I did not do and I did not do this." He tells me to follow him out of the interrogation room.
We sit back down in the office this started in. He looks at me ans says, "I know that is not you on the tape." I breathe a huge sigh of relief and he continues with "Do you know why I had to do that?" My response was "To see if I would confess." To that he responded "No, to eliminate you as a suspect." (If I was smart enough not to cop to the whole thing before did he think I was dumb enough to fall for that one? I don't respond to that). I am told I can go home and thank you for my cooperation.
It is after 5 now so I go home and see Lori (the mom) walking into her front door next door. I wave to get her attention and receive a cold "go to hell look" from her in return as she goes in her door. Several hours later her son comes over to offer his apologies. Apparently he and a local friend, who was 15 or 16, had started making these prank calls at random out of the phone book. The friend would be there until just before I got home from work and then on the two nights I went home after he was "asleep" he would get up and start making the calls on his own. He was going to have a bushel of community service ahead of him, although they seemed to be trying to cut the local kid more slack and hammering the California kid... Lori came over afterwards to apologize for her desire to have me cut to ribbons, which I said was entirely justified since she had reason to believe some demented pedophile might have been watching her kids. She was though going to have to get a baby sitter for the following week since I thought it best that I NOT be over there alone with the kids. I accepted the stupid kid's apology, he basically was a good kid who was trying to fit in in a new town with what turned out to be a bad apple.
Lessons to be learned:
1. Be polite and respectful. Nothing escalates the situation faster than giving lip to the officer, even if he has earned it.
2. Do not admit to anything.
3. Don't panic. I admit I would have bet serious money I was going to receive a beating of some sort. Tone of voice, verbal implications of the well known nut job sheriff's displeasure and body language at several points had me prepared to suffer some abuse. I knew though that even if it hurt signing any confession would have long lasting implications from which I might never recover. How much of a beating could they really give me anyway since the whole shop saw me walk out healthy and knew where I was going.
4. Do not let your fear keep you from mentioning the need for a lawyer. I admit I was slow to do so. Again, I really feared a beating and hoped I could reason my way out of such without signing a confession. In the end I did mention that if I was being arrested I would want one and the interrogation did end not soon after. In hindsight I should have probably brought up the lawyer sooner but I really didn't think they would care.
When detained by an LEO they have enormous power over you. There is good reason to be wary of exposing yourself and remembering their may have nothing to do with your welfare and everything to do with satisfying their boss, making an arrest, getting a confession or a host of other items which are detrimental to you.
