The lovely NYPD brought me here today. Just came to finish up, my community service. Six days. I paid $95.00 after originally arrested for the charge of graffiti. I was basically at a bar down there at Bowery I uh was hanging outside and uh I just met this guy outside and we were talking about, just talking, shooting shit. I said, "like lets go outside for a smoke." I go out there and he like goes too, goes to catch, like climbs up on this thing, next thing I know I see this large like Puerto Rican guy dressed in all fatigues, army fatigues running full speed up the street at us. And I'm like what's going on, I think I'm about to be robbed or killed or something. You know? Next thing I know he pushes me out of the way goes to grab the guy and I'm like, "whoa whoa" trying to break it up like thinking this guys gonna beat his ass or something maybe it's some gang thing, I dunno what's going on. Next thing you know, swarm from all directions, they're throwing me in the car, never once identifying themselves as Police, never showed a badge. I was almost halfway relieved when it was the Police and not just a gang of guys gonna beat me down in the street. But uh, yeah took me down no questions asked right away and I got charged with a charge even though I technically wasn't doing anything as far as I'm concerned.
I was not. I was just there and basically I just got charged with obstruction of justice and they charged me with graffiti, cause they say I interfered and got in the way and hurt the officers little finger, his pinky was hurt and sprained and the poor guy had to uh, exactly this poor guy is like three times my size, like I supposedly hurt his delicate pinky. Next thing you know I'm whisked away for four days in the courthouse and they hold me down there and you know it was not a pleasant experience, I'll tell you that.
In the Tombs for four days. It was a nightmare. It's all cheese sandwiches and if you tell them you know you tell them you're a vegetarian, vegan, you don't eat cheese you know they're like well take it off. You know that's their solution. You get that two times a day and then you get a thing of frosted flakes in the morning which you know of course you gotta eat dry if you don't drink milk.
I was going crazy. You try to drift in and out of sleep. You lose track of time. You hear the same conversations over and over and that's the worst part of like the jailhouse lawyers, everyone's giving you this real great advice in quotations, you know everyone thinks they got the answer but they're in the same place as you. So you know you can't use any advice you hear in there. There's nothing to read. You read the same sign about your like, rights and to be quiet basically a hundred times, it's the only reading material. There's no reading. It's all cold floors and sleep deprivation basically. It's my gist of the whole matter.
Oh it's huge. It's really packed there for some reason. It was the weekend and they were just piling us in there. There was like no floor room even for everyone to lay down. Everyone is basically just sitting on the floor packed in there you're like sardines, it's a nightmare.
You have people you talk to but you, the conversations tend to be, go run in circles. Every time the new people come in they ask the same questions and then you get so tired of hearing the same conversations over and over basically. It's a cycle of the same questions, "when are we gonna go up front? You know let me see the judge, I've been here longer then you, so and so." Pretty much it.
To say the least no. But I've paid my dues to society and I'm rehabilitated. They really, they really turned me around. I have a new lease on life.
Stefan
