FUDGE: Using citizen’s arrest to clean up the mean streets of Brookline

I know most people wouldn’t think it, but I have always wanted to be a police officer. Sure, I seem better fit to be a Pulitzer-winning journalist, but truth be told, I’ve always thought I’d be part of law enforcement. My mother was a cop, my cousin is a cop and I just assumed that one day I’d be one too.

But when I graduated high school and went off to college, my dreams, much like the resiliency of my liver, began to fade. However, as I near graduation, my dream of becoming a protector of our society has been rekindled, and the more I think about it, the more I realize that being a cop is my true calling in life.

So to get back on the path to becoming a policeman, I decided to call the Brookline Police Department and request to take a ride along with one of its fine officers. What better way to re-introduce myself to the life of law enforcement than to jump right back into action with the real deal? Hey, maybe I’d even get to shoot someone.

Unfortunately, the Brookline PD made a laundry list of excuses why I couldn’t ride in one of its cruisers. Something about all the guys being at the shooting range and the captain having to ask permission from his wife, or some similar malarkey. Whatever. I know when I’m not wanted. But just because I have a few priors and several dozen parking violations doesn’t mean I should be discriminated against. I mean, I know police profile, but not white people like me, right?

Well screw ’em. I didn’t need their help; I’d go it alone. Like Maverick in Top Gun, minus all the homosexual undertones with Goose and Iceman. Therefore, I decided to start my own private, one-man law enforcement squad, right in my little corner of Brookline. The following is my log from the first week on the beat.

He has a going problem

I reported myself for public urination outside a Fuller Street residence at 10:30 p.m. on Tuesday night. I would also receive this call from nature at approximately 10:47, 11:03, 11:18 and 11:22 in various locations in the adjacent area.

Sticky fingers for some sticky cans

I apprehended an elderly, homeless woman who was stealing cans from a dumpster behind a Commonwealth Avenue apartment complex Saturday morning. As punishment for trespassing, grand larceny and what I determined to be an utter disregard for the laws of personal hygiene, I made her stand there while I crushed each individual can with my boots. When she informed me that the cans were now worthless and unable to be fed into the Marty’s Liquors recycling machines, I laughed and said, “I know. So that will teach you not to steal, now won’t it, you worthless vagrant.”

Lady in waiting

I responded to an emergency down the hall in my apartment from what sounded like a woman in distress on Thursday at around 8:52 p.m. It turned out that in fact there were no distressing cries, and it was actually my roommate and his girlfriend having sex. For safety precautions, I secured the perimeter and remained at the scene until 9:08, at which point I quietly left and proceeded to take a cold shower.

What not to watch

At 4:30 on Wednesday evening I was called to settle a domestic dispute between two 21-year-old men. Apparently, one had called the other “queer bait” for watching What Not to Wear on TLC. The man contested he was only watching the end of the show and waiting to watch “this [expletive] show on volcanoes that was coming on next.” While I believed his story, I did inform the man he could have watched something else for the three minutes before the volcano show came on. And despite the short amount of time he was watching What Not to Wear, it did, by law, make him “queer bait.”

You burrito believe it

I arraigned Anna’s Taqueria on Harvard Street on the charge of offering insanely delicious burritos at criminally low prices. I also reported the eatery to the INS for multiple immigration infractions.

Trying to pull the old switcheroo

Several citizens reported being harassed by RCN Cable salespeople on Sunday morning. When I approached the suspects, they attempted to speak to me in colloquial and generational language in order to gain my trust. I informed them that this was strictly a Comcast neighborhood and that their second-rate cable company wasn’t welcome here. Upon throwing a dozen flyers at me, they fled across the border into Allston.

Pass the Dutchie

At 10:42 p.m. on Thursday night, I recognized the pungent odor of burning marijuana behind an Egmont Street apartment. I approached the tenants and confiscated what I estimated to be one-eighth of an ounce of cannabis. I returned home, cut it with oregano and sold it to junior high kids in Amory Park for a profit of $80 the following afternoon.

A fearful future

Tuesday evening, I issued violations to multiple residents for inciting fear in the public by placing Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama campaign signs in their yards.

An Egg-cellent time

On Wednesday morning, by what I determined to be mere coincidence, the same residences that refused to remove their Obama and Clinton campaign signs logged several complaints with me about their property being vandalized with what was described as a “barrage of eggs.” I informed them the investigation was currently closed due to a lack of suspects.

* * *

So that’s a little taste of what my week was like as a bona fide enforcer of the law. It wasn’t easy. I had to bust some skulls along the way, play the bad guy at times. But it was worth it. Each day I knew I was protecting my neighbors, fellow American citizens, the laws of this fine country and, most importantly, my personal interest — which isn’t just my dream, but I believe is the dream of all decent Americans.

Brian Fudge, a senior in the College of Communication, has been a weekly columnist for The Daily Free Press. He can be reached at bfudge@bu.edu.