Tuesday for me is usually a long day, I am up at six am and usually tired as band rehearsal was the night before In Jersey and I live on long Island. Anyway, I get up do final show prep, go to the day program, work through lunch, take ten minutes to plug our show on Face book and Twitter, I then drive in two and a half hours of rush hour traffic, do a three hour radio show, usually have a meeting or a talk story with Pip and Davin afterwards, and then drive two hours back home.
As you can see by the end of all this I am very tired and I usually get home between twelve midnight to twelve thirty am.
This particular night as I was exhausted I had to pull over and take a nap as falling asleep while doing eighty going down the New York Thruway is never a good idea.
I finally got back into my home town of Huntington at twelve forty five, and I was debating whether I wanted to eat before I went to bed or just crash out when I got in.
I decided I wanted to have a bite to eat and I also wanted to get a soda and a newspaper to have during dinner.
Your local seven eleven is always that place to pop in and pop out and get on your way.
I go in and notice there looks like a commotion in the parking lot when I get out of the car, but at this time of night it could be an ISIS training exorcise and I don’t care I just want to get my stuff and go home.
I walk into the store and nobody is in there, not even the clerk and I figure it must be due to the altercation out in the parking lot, so I leave my purchase and decide this is the last straw in a long day and I am just going to go home.
As I walk out I see a gentleman having a yelling match with the clerk by his car, this is still none of my business and I am going home.
I then see the man start striking the clerk, and now shit is getting real. As this is happening there is this cab driver who is leaving as he says he has no time to be involved with this shit and pulls away, there are these two other guys who immediately pull out their phones and start filming as I guess they want this to go viral. I immediately pull my phone out and do something really wacky with it I CALL THE FUCKING COPS.
I was on the phone with the 911 operator for about two minutes answering all her questions and feeling embarrassed that I forgot the name of a side street in a town that I have lived in since I was three. As I was speaking to the operator the altercation is still going on, and in the back of my mind I am wondering how long it would take for the police to arrive, and I got my answer, NOT LONG.
As soon as I got off the phone five police cars came literally out of nowhere and swooped right in, they grabbed the assailant and put him right to the ground and in cuffs, the whole thing took less than two minutes and it shows how well the cops work to keep us safe. The last cop to arrive admitted he was three miles away but he got here in less than two minutes, I told him even though he was the last squad car out the five to arrive we still love him.
Now as soon as the police have the guy in cuffs two officers are getting a statement from the clerk, several other cops come up to us bystanders to see what happened. Here is a lesson that needs to be learned from all the videos we see damning the cops in the recent year, “it is the facts and what you actually saw versus what people perceive happened”.
The bystanders where myself and two African American guys (who were also the guys filming the fight I guess looking for the next world Star hip hop video)
Also the assailant was also African American. I told the police my side of the story and I also said that the two other gentlemen are bystanders like me and had nothing to do with the altercation that went on.
Now you may be reading this and saying “ Really Archie Bunker” going out of your way making sure the cops know that black guys did not commit a crime”,, yeah,, because I live in the real world and know about the misconceptions that may happen until the facts are there and how some bystanders are assholes in these situations and don’t look at the facts.
The police said no problem and those gentlemen left to go on their way.
The police noting that I saw the man hitting the clerk wanted to know if I wanted to make a statement. I am tired and want to go home, but ya damn right I do as you can’t complain about things if you don’t want to be involved when it comes your way. And I feel good about myself. The cops say great however at this time of night there is a shift change and it should be forty minutes before a detective arrives to take a statement and then they take my license. Now I feel like an asshole.
The guy who assaulted the clerk was no choir boy, he had a rap sheet down to the floor and his car was stolen, there was also a knife he allegedly threatened the clerk with that he threw but the police dog found. When I heard that I told the cops who’s gonna get some milk bones when they get back to the station.
The Clerk was a very nice Asian man who was shaken but okay with a scratch on the back of his head. The altercation started as the guy tried to steal two cases of beer. To be on the safe side the cops called the local first aid squad to take a look at the clerk. The rescue squad pulls up and in come five woman that look like they can’t be more than seventeen to twenty one and my first reaction is “Don’t you have School in the morning” they were very nice and very good and these people are the unsung heroes of the neighbor hood as at one thirty in the morning they could be home asleep but they are helping people in need.
While this is going on I am still waiting for the police to give me my license back, I don’t have anything to hide but I don’t want to forget, get pulled over and when the cop asks for my license asks for my license and go, “oh, you guys have it”.
Eventually I had it returned to me, and the cops all six of them were cool and I was goofing around with them, they asked me where I was coming from and told them I do a radio show and coming home from there, they were not impressed. They also apologized for the wait and rolled their eyes when they mentioned the wait for the detective to show up, I mentioned a little animosity between you guys and them and they kind of laughed.
At about two o’clock the detectives show up one of them goes behind the counter to write up the report, the other two walk in and congratulate him on his new job as a 7-11 clerk, he offers them free coffee, I say, look at this guy on the job for two minutes and he is already giving shit away.
I gave my statement and I was good to go, over an hour later. I walked out of the store and I see the yellow police crime scene tape and two crime scene trucks and two more cop cars realizing that it must have been a slow night.
I got home and explained to the co-owner of the house why I am late and she asks if I am okay and told her “no I was shot five times” and went to bed.
I got three hours of sleep, no dinner, no soda, no paper but the satisfaction that I took action and wanted to help someone in need.
The story even made the local bulletin.