First They Came for the People Who Want to Go to the Library Without Walking Past the Police Station
We already knew that parking lots are more or less comparable to war zones. Now it turns out that having a police station near the library is almost — just almost, we don’t want to get carried away or anything — as bad as Nazi Germany.
At least the author is aptly named– Ms. Nutt
posted by wendy on September 19th, 2006 at 11:30 am eSee, this is why we have Godwin’s Law.
posted by Larry Kestenbaum on September 19th, 2006 at 12:33 pm eI hate to think of the letters that the Ann Arbor News declines to print.
posted by haenck on September 19th, 2006 at 1:18 pm elet’s see…
Police station near Library…
Millions dead, Countries in ruin, Years of rebuilding…
Yeah they’re equally depressing.
Long live hyperbole and superlatives!
posted by abc on September 19th, 2006 at 2:00 pm eNazis are so played out.
If you have to resort to this kind of defamation, you should reference NUCLEAR ZOMBIE VISIGOTHS.
If Ms. Nutt had said that having police next to the library would have been like having NUCLEAR ZOMBIE VISIGOTHS next to the library, she would have made a compelling and insightful comparison.
oo! Or SPASMODIC RABID GIANT BATS.
posted by Nitro on September 19th, 2006 at 2:38 pm eHer letter is overly dramatic, but in Ms. Nutt’s defense (she is a neighbor of mine), she is a 75-year old African-American woman who was issued a misdemeanor citation and the police attempted to bring her to trial for the egregious offense of walking along the railroad tracks. The stress of the trial process and the possibility of as much as a year in jail was so upsetting to her that she finally agreed to settle, at which time they fined her $100 and gave her something like a three year probation period. She ended up paying over $500 in legal fees plus the fine. She lives right near the tracks so she can see that the police do turn a blind eye to people walking along them during football, hockey, and basketball games and frankly, almost every other time, unless you are a 16-year old or an elderly African-American woman. So I can understand why she is a bit nervous. Even most of the A2 police are embarrassed about her arrest. A simple warning would have sufficed. The police overreacted so now she is overreacting.
posted by Juliew on September 19th, 2006 at 3:23 pm eI know how ridiculous this case was, but there are equally ridiculous MIP cases, and I’d have the same reaction to an undergrad arguing that his drinking arrest makes the AAPD equivalent to the Gestapo.
posted by ann arbor is overrated on September 19th, 2006 at 3:36 pm eWhat is with the Ann Arbor police and that railroad? I know a guy my department who paid a fine and did community service (also after a court trial, a misdemeanor, etc.) when he was ticketed for running on the right-of-way at 8:00 am. It’s frankly ludicrous.
posted by Heidi on September 19th, 2006 at 3:50 pm eGeez, I didn’t even know there was anything wrong with walking on the tracks. In my 25-year career of walking on railroad tracks I’ve never so much as been warned, let alone fined or arrested.
posted by Dave on September 19th, 2006 at 4:20 pm eOops, should I have admitted that here? I bet the police chief reads this blog.
posted by Dave on September 19th, 2006 at 4:22 pm eDave can I have your full name and address please?
posted by Barnett Jones on September 19th, 2006 at 4:32 pm eI thought the prosecution of Ms. Nutt was disgusting. I don’t know what her lawyer did to justify his/her $500 in legal fees. Why didn’t she demand a trial? “No jury in the world….”
posted by Dave Cahill on September 19th, 2006 at 7:19 pm eYou may think the remark about Nazi Germany is catchy, but it is more apt than you think.
posted by sue on September 19th, 2006 at 8:05 pm eJust as in the early 1930’s in Nazi Germany, Jews are being harrassed and intimidated just for being Jews, right here in Ann Arbor. For the last four years, anti-Israel demonstrators at Beth Israel Congregation on Washtenaw Avenue have been showing up every single Saturday, to heckle Jews on their way in and out of the synagogue. This past week, while the group of protesters screamed the usual epithets and encouraged drivers by to honk (as they always do, to disrupt services going on inside) another protester PHOTOGRAPHED the Jews and THEIR CHILDREN as they entered the synagogue. Why photograph? I don’t know, but I sure would not want a hostile screaming group aiming their cameras at me and my kids.
And what is the city or the citizens of Ann Arbor doing to support their fellow Jewish Ann Arborites?
Not much.
So yes, first they came for……….
Is this being sponsored by the state?
posted by Dale on September 19th, 2006 at 8:17 pm eSue,
Ann Arbor is not Nazi Germany. Sweet lord. Yes, as a gay guy, I’ve been known (especially after Prop 2 passed) to say things about how I’m not waiting for them to load me onto a train. I’ll get out of this place (MI) well before that. But to liken a fringe group of loonies to the Holocaust? I just don’t get it.
What would you like me and my Jewish husband to do? Should we hold a counter protest? We already know that speaking to the protesters is like speaking to a box of rocks. And they probably feel the same way about me. They’re not changing their views. And I’m not changing mine.
From what I can tell, the anti-Jewish protesters number in the what, 10s? 20s at most? Can someone help me out here? And that somehow makes Ann Arbor equal to Nazi Germany? Could you explain it a little more, please?
Oh, and to have something that’s on topic. I would support the AAPD ticketing all those who walk on the tracks at any point. Why single out an old woman? And an Ann Arbor resident at that! We should stick it to the out-of-towners. We are, after all, better than they.
posted by Young OWSider on September 19th, 2006 at 8:25 pm eReading Elaine N.’s missive to the Snooze — at first without being aware of her background as described above by Juliew — the nazi line at the end instantly transformed her comments into self-parody. You could easily imagine the quiet chuckling in the editorial room when the decision was made to run her letter. But putting aside the literal absurdity of her comparison, you can now feel the intensity of her anger over the casually cruelty with which her minor & rarely enforced infraction was handled. And while police can, and do, get pretty stupid in some situations when doling out MIP violations, undergrads quite typically can handle such abuse more easily, with their greater access to (parental?) resources, than a great many retired seniors struggling to get by on Social Security and (maybe) a modest pension.
——————————————-
An August column by Jared G. in the Daily, which starts off with a take on Godwin’s Law, includes this anecdote on hyperbole near the end:
_”In a history class last winter, my professor told a story of a French philosopher who came to the University in the 1960s. This philosopher had lived under Nazi occupation and the puppet Vichy regime and remembered it vividly. Crossing the Diag one day, he encountered student protestors, who were unhappy with then University President Robben Fleming. They called his administration “fascist.” The French philosopher answered back: “I lived under the Nazis. I lived under fascist rule. If you think that this is fascism, then you have absolutely no idea what you’re talking about.”_
posted by hale on September 19th, 2006 at 11:29 pm eWell, I still think it’s appropriate, especially after hearing the full story, to compare the Ann Arbor Police to NUCLEAR ZOMBIE VISIGOTHS.
I have known them to be particular about what and whom they prosecute, and sometimes the targets seem a little easy.
posted by Nitro on September 20th, 2006 at 8:46 am eNot that that’s unusual, or anything.
posted by Nitro on September 20th, 2006 at 8:47 am eIt’s true they target 16-year-olds on those tracks. When my friend was 16 she was ticketed for using the route as a shortcut to go from one community volunteer group to another. Delinquent, indeed. Or maybe it was because she was Jewish.
posted by mc on September 20th, 2006 at 3:45 pm eAre the nuclear zombie visigoths Jewish?
posted by Dave on September 20th, 2006 at 4:55 pm eDivest from nuclear zombie visigoths!!!!!
posted by tim on September 20th, 2006 at 11:49 pm eIs this going to become a burdensome problem when the greenway is located adjacent to the railroad?
posted by Louis on September 21st, 2006 at 1:50 am ePerhaps we can satisfy both groups (not the Nazis and Nuclear Zombie Visigoths). It occurred to me that there is a third option to keep the precious “Green Way†and have parking structures. Why do we just build down instead of up? You could build a 10 story parking garage underground and put a park on top, you could even make the exhaust fans an amusement ride, just a thought. As far as railroad tracks and parking tickets, the police, here or anywhere else, have always been predatory in nature. They pick the weak and the young over someone who might cause them trouble. I am not surprised her attorney didn’t advise her to push to trial and I do feel sorry she was treated this way, just wait till her oppressors get old, but wait they’ll have healthy police pensions to fall back on.
~Remember the power you give the government today you give to the government of tomorrow!
posted by Andrew on September 24th, 2006 at 11:31 am eUnderground parking is fearsomely expensive. Hence, proposals for this kind of parking in AA routinely get ditched.
posted by Dave Cahill on September 24th, 2006 at 11:38 am ethe city and the university enforce the railway trespass as a public safety measure.
is that wrong?
posted by peter honeyman on September 24th, 2006 at 12:23 pm eYes, it’s wrong, because the enforcement is arbitrary and capricious.
posted by Dave Cahill on September 24th, 2006 at 3:40 pm eUnderground parking, sure, but not in a flood zone.
posted by Larry Kestenbaum on September 24th, 2006 at 5:11 pm eTo enforce it selectively is certainly wrong. Think of the money they could make on football Sundays, hitting up the middle-aged white guy alums filing along the tracks toward the stadium! Think of the whiny letters in the Snooze we could read for months afterward!
posted by Chris on September 25th, 2006 at 9:43 am eSaturdays. Not Sundays.
posted by Chris on September 25th, 2006 at 11:16 am eHm. A comment of mine, submitted on September 4, saying “Yes, it’s wrong, because the enforcement is arbitrary and capricious”, is still not visible.
Above the comment is a notice (to me only) saying “Your comment is awaiting moderation.”
posted by Dave Cahill on September 26th, 2006 at 8:25 am eFrom today’s AA News Letters:
“You were inconvenienced, Ms. Nutt. My family was exterminated.”
As far as the opinion page goes, I find this refreshingly blunt.
posted by Murph on September 26th, 2006 at 11:56 am eWow.
posted by ann arbor is overrated on September 26th, 2006 at 12:39 pm eThe Library lot is not in a flood plain.
posted by justme on September 26th, 2006 at 8:19 pm e“You were inconvenienced, Ms. Nutt. My family was pillaged, exposed to eerie radioactive rays, and ultimately, their brains were eaten by NUCLEAR ZOMBIE VISIGOTHS.”
posted by Nitro on September 27th, 2006 at 10:50 am eThanx to aaio for restoring my two missing comments!
posted by Dave Cahill on September 29th, 2006 at 9:57 pm edave cahill, please speak to the issue: what is wrong with (proper) enforcement? railroad right-of-way trespassers have been killed or injured by passing trains. should not the police enforce the trespass prohibition as a public safety measure?
posted by peter honeyman on September 30th, 2006 at 12:06 am eso dave, are we to assume that we can only have laws if we are able to enforce them 100% of the time for 100% of the infractions? i seem to recall in my psychology classes that the variable ratio reinforcement is the kind most resistant to extinction, so by that logic, if you can’t enforce the law 100% of the time (totally unrealistic), the next best thing is VR, which is how speeding tickets, traffic citations, railway trespassing, etc are issued.
posted by tim on September 30th, 2006 at 3:24 am eIt is apparent that the police discriminate in favor of football fans and against “singletons” in enforcing the trespass statute. The mention of 100% enforcement is, of course, a straw person, and need not detain us.
posted by Dave Cahill on September 30th, 2006 at 3:55 pm eGoddess knows that 100 percent enforcement is impossible, but ticketing always seems capricious to those who get caught. Any data to back up your claims, Dave?
posted by Dale on September 30th, 2006 at 4:32 pm eA good question to ask is: do the trains run when football games are going on?
I don’t recall ever seeing a train come by our place on game day. I may be mistaken. Anyone else know for sure?
If I ran the railroad, I’d avoid running the trains for home football games too…..for obvious reasons.
…that would explain (to me, at least) why the cops don’t care about the train tracks 7 days out of the year.
posted by todd on September 30th, 2006 at 5:13 pm eIt might be fun to compare data about ticket issuances under this statute with the times that trains come through. Does anyone know if a train was about to arrive/depart when Ms. Nutt was ticketed?
posted by Dave Cahill on October 1st, 2006 at 9:24 am eDave, that’s not data. That’s nothing.
posted by Dale on October 1st, 2006 at 10:22 am eTodd, the trains do not run on football Saturdays. There is no law, however, that says it is legal to walk on the tracks on those days (unlike parking on lawns, which is specifically allowed on football Saturdays, but illegal all other days).
posted by Juliew on October 1st, 2006 at 1:08 pm ewas she busted on the michigan central or the AARR?
posted by peter honeyman on October 1st, 2006 at 1:23 pm eAARR between Hill and Hoover.
posted by Juliew on October 1st, 2006 at 9:45 pm ego blue
posted by fan on October 2nd, 2006 at 8:23 am eWhile we’re talking about police actions on game days versus other days lets look at the real big issue, enforcement of the open container law. Heaven forbid a student has an open can of beer at 2 am on a sat. morning because police are out hunting them down, a mere eight hours later however you can have a group of 15 walk by several officers, with nothing done.
AA police is a joke with there ideas of enforcement. My favorite is when Chief Oates came to town and prohibited parking on the grass between the sidewalk and the street saying it’s a safety issue. Funny it hadn’t been a saftey issue the entire summer before that when DTE had a stack of yellow tubes on that very strip of grass in front of my house, which repeatedly ended up getting knocked into the road, and in front of my driveway.
posted by anon on October 2nd, 2006 at 1:48 pm e“was she busted on the michigan central or the AARR?” Peter, you’re dating yourself there a bit or are a big train geek like me? Not been called that in a while.
posted by Thomas Cook on October 2nd, 2006 at 3:25 pm eyou guys sure are funny to read. I’m in East Lansing and I sure am looking forward to trouncing your sorry overrated football team on Saturday. Might plant an MSU flag on your hallowed AAAR or Mi Central train trestle.
(wow did I type that with a straight face?)
posted by rob on October 2nd, 2006 at 10:36 pm eSo trounce them already, if it makes you so happy. Who cares? They’re overrated anyway.
posted by Nitro on October 3rd, 2006 at 1:29 pm e