Friday, December 09, 2005
Constabulary discretion
Normally, I'm a law and order guy. But this is ridiculous:
I bet they do, seeing as how they run around cuffing people for being helpful.
ATLANTA - Transit police handcuffed and cited a man who sold a $1.75 subway token to another rider who was having trouble with a token vending machine. Transit authority spokeswoman Jocelyn Baker said Friday that the officer "acted within the law" after he spotted Donald Pirone, 42, selling the token Nov. 30 inside the West End subway station.
Instead of giving Pirone a warning, the officer decided to handcuff him and give him the misdemeanor citation under a 1992 state law that bars passengers from selling Metropolitan Atlanta Rapid Transit Authority tokens, she said.
"What you've got to keep in mind is that fare abuse is a chronic problem," Baker said. "It costs MARTA millions of dollars every year."
Baker acknowledged that Pirone sold the token at face value and did not make a profit. But the law is the law, she said.
"There are customer service phones for people who are having trouble getting tokens out of the machine," Baker said. [Anybody wanna bet how helpful the customer service phones are when you're trying to get where you are going at rush hour? - ed.] "The fact is, our officer acted within the law."
As for the handcuffs, Baker said the officer felt they were necessary.
"Our officers do that for their own safety," Baker said.
I bet they do, seeing as how they run around cuffing people for being helpful.
2 Comments:
By 
Sluggo, at
Fri Dec 09, 02:07:00 PM:
"Transit Authority Spokesperson"
Just below Catheter Tester on the list of respected trades.
By 
, at
Fri Dec 09, 07:03:00 PM:
Same thing happened to two lawyer friends a couple of years ago in New Orleans, where they were selling 2 extra Jazzfest tickets for precisely face value ($12, I think -- who knew it was illegal, in the land of the go-cup?). Cuffed, taken to jail. I had to bail them out, and we went to trial the next weekday -- where the judge let them go and apologized profusely, thank goodness -- MCU
