Liar, Liar... or The Law Enforcement Drama Continues

When the deputy called that awful night I had given up waiting for the phone to ring. I'd managed to stop crying. My hand was already on the doorknob as I left to go to the ER when I heard the sound and turned and went back to pick up the receiver.

If you've read my earlier posts you know that that conversation didn't go well. I basically begged the deputy to just come out to the apartment and he continued to repeat that there was nothing he could do to help so coming to the apartment was completely useless. At one point he asked if I just wanted him to go over and talk to our neighbor. When I said yes he acted like he hadn't heard me and continued to say there was nothing that could be done.

I was upset. My daughter was in the ER without me and she'd been put there by someone using a drug that is still completely illegal under federal law. I finally said: "Fine, so you aren't going to do anything. And I need to go to the hospital. But I want you to know that I am going to do absolutely everything in my power to tell everyone that I possibly can that you did NOTHING to help us." I turned off the phone, handed it to my mom, who was there to stay with Maggie, burst into tears and walked out the door.

I don't think the deputy expected me to keep my promise, but the next morning I was determined. I was also considerably less upset with the deputy, personally. In fact, by afternoon my frustration with him had been transformed into frustration with a law that either a) didn't exist to protect children from this situation (if he was correct) or b) was so unclear that he really hadn't known what to do. Either way I wanted things cleared up.

My focus became ensuring that there was legislation in place to protect children from the seemingly inevitable plume of smoke that's going to descend on California next month when marijuana is "legalized."

So I didn't complain about the deputy during the interview. In fact when talking with an official in town I excused it saying, "I know he has a very tough job." I tried to focus on the larger picture.

And then the phone rang again. Only this time I was at my parent's house having dinner with the girls and Paul was working on a project for school and getting ready to leave for work so he answered. It was the same deputy. He was just "checking in" to see how Sadie was doing and was "following up" on what had happened since he'd spoken with me. It was interesting that he hadn't seemed even vaguely interested in her well being when we'd spoken before. In fact the only thing he'd been interested in was telling me there was nothing he could do and getting off the pone.

Paul told him that I would return his call later. And then he started to talk. And talk. And talk.

He told Paul that he understood that I was upset about the baby but that I had repeatedly demanded that he come and arrest our neighbor. I was shocked when Paul told me this because I never even mentioned arresting him. I wanted documentation. I wanted the man to be informed by the authorities that he was endangering a child. And I wanted them to see her room and see exactly what the problem was. I wanted to prevent it from happening again.

He continued by saying that of course he couldn't arrest the guy, so I had been upset (now we're entering the realm of pure fantasy). Then he told Paul that he'd actually driven out and driven by several times. He'd even gotten out of the car and gone up to the apartment, but said that he didn't smell anything. Paul pointed out that we never thought he'd been smoking outside.

We both doubt that he did anything of the sort since he was so adamant in his refusal earlier and since someone was at our apartment with all the lights blazing the entire time and he never stopped by.

But I think he's realized that I meant what I said. And I think that he's trying to cover up the fact that he did nothing with a fanciful world of make believe in which I'm entirely incoherent and hysterical.

On that note, I certainly won't be glossing over his arrogant attitude (or lazy refusal to even investigate what was going on) any longer. If he wants to make up stories and lie about what I did I am going to respond by very clearly speaking the truth about his role in all of this.

Hopefully next time someone asks for his help he'll do his job instead of sitting in his patrol car and telling them there's nothing he can do to help.