FOUR DAYS IN HELL-Conclusion

“Mr. Parrish?”

“Yes, sir.”

“You’re John Parrish? John William Parrish?”

“Yes, sir.”

I’m thinking, you know who I am. We met just a few hours ago.

It was Officer Overzealous again.

“Mr. Parrish, you have a felony warrant for shoplifting”, starts reaching for his handcuffs, “and we’re here to arrest you and take you in. Please put your hands behind your back.”

I was dumbstruck! Stunned. Speechless. What the HELL was was going on??

All I could manage to say was,”What? W..w..what? Whadda, whadda, what are you talking about???”

I could not believe what was happening! 30 seconds ago I was standing on a rooftop doing carpentry work and now I was standing in front of a growing crowd of onlookers, being handcuffed and escorted to a patrol car! And I had no idea why!

Have you ever been asleep enjoying a pleasant dream that felt so realistic you didn’t realize it was a dream? Then some minor little detail happens that doesn’t quite make sense and the whole dream just starts getting weirder and weirder from there? Until your subconscious finally frightens you out of it?

That’s what it felt like. Like I was dreaming and couldn’t will myself to wake up!

Honestly, the only reason I could think of that they could possibly be arresting me was for some unresolved warrant from my youth! I’m not gonna lie, I went through a brief delinquent streak as a young man. I had my run-ins with the law back in the day. But I have not committed a criminal act since I was 20 years old!!! I’ve spent my entire adult life staying out of trouble.

This just didn’t make any sense! It didn’t even occur to me that this could be a Georgia related arrest because I’d only been there for a week!!

So, I’m sitting in the back of his patrol car in disbelief when Officer Overzealous ducks his head in and asks where I was and what I was doing Friday night around 11 pm. Relief rushed over me! Friday night at 11 pm I was in my room at the LaQuinta!! Remember, I didn’t even have my car!

“Did you go anywhere while you were staying at the hotel?” He asked.

“No. I did walk to the Krystal Burger right on the corner for dinner, though.”

“And where was this?”

“Right there on the corner. It was the closest place to the hotel. I ate there then walked right back to the hotel.”

“Can anyone confirm that you were in your room that night?”

Right then my relief turned to fear. (The chronology is a little foggy now, but I believe I had already been mirandized by then. In hindsight, I should have just shut my mouth at that point. But I was still trying to be cooperative AND convince him of my innocence!)

I realized he wasn’t just asking questions, I was being interrogated! They were ACTUALLY convinced that they had the right guy in custody!!

Now here’s the kicker!

Are you ready for this??

As if this story wasn’t already something right out of the Twilight Zone, I was accused of shoplifting items from an adult novelty store worth enough value to make it a FELONY offense!!

Yep.

(I would later Google the distance from my hotel to the novelty store. 3.4 miles.)

So let me get this straight. I have not committed a crime since 1992. And I’ve never been accused of shoplifting. But for whatever reason, I drove from Texas to Georgia so that I could drop off my car at a repair shop then walk 3.4 miles, at 11 o’clock at night, to an adult novelty store I’ve never been to before and steal some sex toys? Then turn around and walk 3.4 miles back to my hotel??

Now, I’ll admit there wasn’t too much to do in Brunswick, Georgia but I wasn’t THAT FUCKING BORED!!!

About that time a portly, older Officer came and introduced himself.

“Mr. Parrish, I’m Sergeant Europe Shitcreek. Do you understand the charges that are being brought upon you? You understand you do not have to talk to us until you have a lawyer?”

“Yes, I understand but I’m telling you I did not do this. I don’t know what’s going on but….”

Then it dawned on me. It could only be one thing. “Wait a minute. If you’re so sure this was me then you must have a video or something of my car leaving the store! I was not in possession of my car Friday night! I’ve already told y’all it was at the auto shop! My mechanic Phil can confirm that….hold on…hold on…..!”

My mind started going a hundred miles an hour!!

Phil must have been involved! Those guys at the auto shop must have taken my car and did this!! This is probably some fucking scam they pull on all poor out-of-towners that come through here with car problems! I bet my car never even needed that ignition coil! It’s probably been fixed since Friday and they’ve been driving it around all weekend!

Phil’s friend Issac! The guy who gave me a ride back to the hotel! He seemed a little sketchy to me!! Holy shit, I bet it was him! Phil probably let him take my car! Holy shit, I can’t believe this is happening!!

My brain was racing!

“Talk to Phil, the mechanic! Someone is setting me up, man!! I swear I didn’t do this!! The people at the shop must have done this!”

Sergeant Shitcreek and Officer Overzealous didn’t seem to give my theory any consideration. To me it appeared as far as they were concerned, they didn’t need to look any further.

This made me incredulous (I’ve always wanted to use that word in a sentence!)

Something else would happen before leaving the college that would give me pause.

I was sitting in the patrol car shaking my head, muttering to myself, “someone is setting me up”. Overzealous overheard me and shouted through the door, “The police don’t do that!”

I wasn’t even thinking the police could be involved! But after that outburst now I wasn’t sure what to think.

That’s when I began to really get worried. What if this was some small town racket? Perpetrated on unsuspecting travelers who have the misfortune of passing through. What if the auto shop AND the cops are working together to set me up?!

Maybe I’d seen too many horror movies.

But in my heightened state of concern, this didn’t seem out of the realm of possibility.

“Sergeant Shitcreek asked, “Mr. Parrish is your car still at Dependable Auto?”

“I sure hope so!”

“Would you be willing to give us permission to search your car? You will present when we do.”

“Yes, but if you find anything in my car I want you to dust it for my fingerprints.”

We left the campus and drove to the auto shop.

Officer Overzealous performed the search of my vehicle. Something was telling me he was going to find the stolen merchandise in my car.

He didn’t find anything. And he was visibly disappointed.

After the searched yielded no evidence we were soon on our way to the county jail. But before leaving the shop another question occurred to me.

I asked Shitcreek if the adult store employee could supposedly identify me out of a line up.

I will never forget this, he leaned in very slowly and said with a self-righteous tone, “YES!!”

BULLSHIT! There’s no way they could I.D. me out of a line up! I wasn’t there!

Unless someone showed them a picture of me and asked if I was their shoplifter? But how would they get a picture of me? Hold on, Officer Overzealous took pictures of me earlier that morning!

So did they show the store clerk my picture along with other suspects pictures or did they just show my picture alone to get the identification?

Another thing I would learn as I was being booked into Glynn County Detention Center was that the store clerk swore in her police statement that she confronted “me” when she noticed “I” was stealing from the store. And that I told her my name was John Parrish! Why would I tell an adult novelty store clerk my REAL name if she caught me stealing? I’d make up a name! C’mon!!

I’m no lawyer but wouldn’t prosecution have to prove, without a shadow of a doubt, that this confrontation took place? Wouldn’t she, the store clerk, have to identify me, under oath, in a court of law?

Maybe I’ve seen too many legal movies.

So next thing I know, I’m in felony blues in “C” block, general population. For the next four days I share a cell block with 29 other convicts like myself.

I went from being a free bird to a caged rat in the blink of an eye.

It took a couple days to get in sync with the routine of Glynn County jail. My cell mates were alright, though. I would talk to a few of them here and there and we all ate meals together but mostly I kept to myself. I would lay on my cot in my cell and read. Or try to sleep. Or I’d lay there and stare at the ugly industrial-beige colored brick wall and wonder if I’d actually died without realizing it and this was Hell.

If this wasn’t hell then it had to be a nightmare. When was I going to wake up! Why was this happening to me? What was I being punished for?

Those are actual thoughts I allowed myself to have. If you’re looking to feel sorry for yourself, being incarcerated is a great place to start!

But the fact was there were still people in the world who had it much worse than me. Was I in a bad place? Yes. Would I be there indefinitely? No.

Four days in Hell was quite enough, thank you!