I was only a summer police officer for a resort area in Wisconsin, but with resort areas come very interesting people and very interesting calls. In the middle of summer, at about five p.m. dispatch contacted me: "one-two-three Sauk, we have a report of a suspicious black male wearing white near the florist shop at 134 West Monroe Avenue. Wants to speak to an officer."
"Ten-four Sauk, 10-76."
While on my way, I wasn't thinking much about the call. It's a resort town, and everyone could look out of place or suspicious. I also thought it could be a person who might be prejudiced and just trying to get someone in trouble. The village's resident population is only 2,000 people, but in the summer the population of the village and the bordering town, another tourist trap, can rise to about 50,000 to 100,000. There are the quiet days, but it can get busy fast.
I arrived at the florist and didn't see anyone matching that description. I went in and found a hysterical female in her mid-twenties. She told me, in between crying fits, that a male black wearing all white had scared the crap out of her. She had been out watering her flowers in the front of her store when she saw the man walking by. She said he kept looking at her and wouldn't stop. She ran back into the store to get away from him, but he kept staring at her from outside. He wouldn't go away, and at that point she called the police.
I asked her if he said anything to her or did anything to her, and she said he hadn't. I asked her if she knew where he was or the last direction he was seen going. She said she last seen him near the Laundromat across the street. I asked for more information about his physical description and she told me, "He's a black guy wearing all white. You can't miss him." Well, I thought, the usual harmless kook. Still, I'd like to get a look at this person.
I drove across the street and checked out the parking lot, but still no suspicious person wearing all white. I entered the Laundromat and looked around inside really quickly from the doorway, Still no suspicious person. As I was looking around, I heard something behind me and whirled around quickly. Lo and behold, I spotted him, hiding in the bathroom. I chuckled and thought, That's original. The second he saw me, his eyes went wide and he shut the door.
I knocked on the door and he knocked back. I knocked again and announced myself. I informed him I needed to speak with him. Then a voice came from behind the door, "I can't come out."
"Why not?"
"Because I'm hiding."
I had to stop myself from laughing out loud. This guy was a riot. "Who are you hiding from?"
"You."
By this time, I was holding my sides and my hand was over my mouth so he couldn't hear me laughing. I managed to get out, in an even voice, "Well, will you please come out now that I've found you?"
There were a few moments of complete silence, and then I got a mumbled response that he was going to be right out. After a few seconds of fumbling around and then a flush, he came out. And sure enough, he was a mid-forties black male wearing all white. He was wearing a white suit jacket, white pants, and white shoes–tennis shoes with all other colors scratched off or painted over. He was also wearing a pillowcase folded small enough to be used as a bandana on his head and had painted his fingernails white using Wite-Out. He was also carrying a white pillowcase. Why do I get all the fruitcakes?
I asked the man to come out of the bathroom and step outside so we could talk. He came outside without any resistance and at this point another officer arrived. He took one look at the man in white, leaned against his patrol car, and said, "You go right ahead. I wouldn't think of interfering."
I gave him the look I usually reserve for kids when they're being wise and turned back to the desperate criminal. I asked him if he had any guns, knives, bazookas, or similar weapons on him and if I could have permission to look inside the pillowcase for my safety. He said he had no weapons and that he had a law degree (they always do) and to search him was illegal.
"Let me see your degree," I said.
My partner piped up behind me, "Good question, Dan."
I ignored him and told Mr. White that I only wanted to look in the pillowcase for my own safety and to make sure that we would all be safe. After a few seconds of thinking and persuading, he finally gave consent and said I could search the pillowcase. When I looked inside, I found that he had a bunch of other pillowcases in it and about thirty white BIC disposable razors with the razor blades taken out.
He said he was just traveling. I asked him why he was bothering the woman across the street, and he said he wanted to ask her for directions, but she just kept getting away from him. I asked him why he had so many razors, and he told me that he collected them. I was able to get a WI ID off of him and ran him through dispatch. He came back clean, and I asked him if he had family in the area. He said he didn't. His ID said he was from Milwaukee, and I asked if he had any family there. He said he did, but they didn't talk to him.
I asked him if he would like for me to contact them so they could pick him up. He didn't want me to.
In our area we sometimes offer transients or homeless people a bus ticket from the local shelters so they can go to Minnesota or Chicago to get them on their way. I offered him a bus ticket, but he turned it down and told me he'd find his own way.
My partner and I agreed that we didn't have enough for any criminal charges and, as odd as he was, we didn't have enough to take him to the hospital for a mental commitment. We were worried that he might have been a patient at a state mental facility but that would have come up when we ran him through dispatch. My radar was tweaking just a bit–the guy was strange, no doubt about that, and almost certainly harmless, and just too much of a hoot. But there was just a teeny little bell going off in the back of my head. We just didn't have anything on him, so I decided to ignore it. Besides, we were having such a laugh.
We informed him that as long as he didn't harass anyone else, we would just cut him loose but put an advisory within our department and neighboring agencies for other officers to keep an eye out for him in case he was up to something.
After he left, my partner and I laughed till we cried and I went back to the florist again to talk to the female Reporting Person to reassure her we had handled it and he was on his way. I told her that we cut him loose and that he shouldn't be a problem anymore. She thanked me and I left the florist. I forgot about the little warning bell in the back of my head and the man in white.
I left the florist thinking that would be the end of my suspicious black male wearing all white. And for me it was. But two days later one of the female officers in my department came up to me and said, "My husband arrested your guy wearing white." For a second I was confused about what she was talking about, and then it dawned on me. Apparently the man in white had gone to that city and flashed a woman in public. Of course he was an easy person to describe and was easily arrested by my coworker's husband for attacking a woman in a florist shop. I just stood there with my mouth open. My instincts were right.
So the moral of the story is this: This job is serious. Sometimes it's funny as hell, but it's always serious. You just never know what kind of people you will run into.