The (Low Budget) Fugitive
Nov. 5th, 2009 08:23 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
hafoc
At work today I heard Oz ranting three cubicles down. It's hard not to. But his story was so good this time that I'm posting it here, with his permission. I even know that part of it, at least, was true before The Names were Changed to Protect the... whatever they were.
And Now Cometh Oz, saying:
So my dad says "What's the big deal? Guy sank a boat in Lake Huron, it's fish habitat. You bastards are driving all the small businessmen out of the State." There's the conservative Republican for you.
See, this small businessmen We Bastards are oppressing this time started out by setting fire to that boat. He tried to burn it up and collect insurance on it. So this poor victim we're picking on started out with insurance fraud. You'd think a law and order Republican would have problems with that.
Willis-- guy's name is Willis-- Willis had problems with it, because the boat didn't burn, and the insurance didn't pay. So he's got this half-burned boat in his yard. By and by City of Chebavoix police chief comes by, and the zoning guy, and they tell him to get rid of that boat or they're going to write him a hundred-dollar ticket for blight. And I got in there too, telling him it was illegal solid waste disposal, trying to burn it like that, and he'd better find something else to do with the boat. Something LEGAL.
A few days later, around midnight, he hooks up to the boat and drags it through the middle of town. Without a trailer, mind you; dragging the boat on its bottom, scratching and gouging the asphalt along the way. About halfway through town he goes right by a couple of city cops. They drop their donuts and come out to ask him about this. "You didn't see me," he says, "and I was never here." And they nod and go back and sit in their prowl car and let him drag the boat the rest of the way through town. I can't believe it, but that's what they did. The Good Old Boy network at its best.
Half an hour, forty-five minutes later the city cops see Willis coming back without the boat. They never asked any questions.
Turns out Willis had sunk the boat in Lake Huron. Only the boat wouldn't burn, and it turned out it wouldn't sink either. The Coast Guard found this half-burned forty-foot wreck bobbing around in the Straits of Mackinac, right in the shipping lanes. It didn't take them any time at all to trace it back to Willis.
We tried to take him to court, but now he'd broken Federal laws too, and the Feds take precedence. Now he's got a date to appear in Federal court. Remember, this all started with a hundred-dollar blight ticket, right?
Willis never shows up in court. The US Marshall goes to his house and knocks on his door, and his wife says Willis has disappeared. She doesn't know where he went, or how, or who with. She says some guys from downstate were threatening him, and she thinks maybe they kidnapped or murdered him or something.
Well, what had happened was that Willis had this old school bus, and he loaded everything he owned in it, and hit the road. He's fleeing the Federal Government in an old school bus, and damned if he doesn't drive the thing all the way to Costa Rica. He's down there living in his school bus with an extension cord pulling power from some other guy's house, when he can find somebody who lets him. That's his life now.
One day he gets drunk and tells people he's on the run from the US Government for sinking a boat in Lake Huron. Which sounds like he's some kind of pirate, right? Guys he's with think he's full of crap, but one of them checks on the Internet and he finds that sure enough there's a Federal warrant for Willis. So he reports Willis to the local police. And now Willis is on the run again.
You gotta think they'd catch him if they wanted to. I mean, like Andy said, the guy's got to stick out a little, driving around Costa Rica in a huge yellow bus with CHEBAVOIX AREA SCHOOLS in eight-inch black letters down the side.
He can't come back. It's a hundred-dollar ticket that started all this, but now he's run from the Federal courts, and they'll put him in jail forever for that. And his wife will end up in jail too for lying to the US Marshall.
Sometimes you start with one silly little crime, and try to cover it up, and one thing leads to another, and you find yourself running from the law, driving a beat-up old school bus through the jungles three thousand miles from home, and heading for Brazil.
And Now Cometh Oz, saying:
So my dad says "What's the big deal? Guy sank a boat in Lake Huron, it's fish habitat. You bastards are driving all the small businessmen out of the State." There's the conservative Republican for you.
See, this small businessmen We Bastards are oppressing this time started out by setting fire to that boat. He tried to burn it up and collect insurance on it. So this poor victim we're picking on started out with insurance fraud. You'd think a law and order Republican would have problems with that.
Willis-- guy's name is Willis-- Willis had problems with it, because the boat didn't burn, and the insurance didn't pay. So he's got this half-burned boat in his yard. By and by City of Chebavoix police chief comes by, and the zoning guy, and they tell him to get rid of that boat or they're going to write him a hundred-dollar ticket for blight. And I got in there too, telling him it was illegal solid waste disposal, trying to burn it like that, and he'd better find something else to do with the boat. Something LEGAL.
A few days later, around midnight, he hooks up to the boat and drags it through the middle of town. Without a trailer, mind you; dragging the boat on its bottom, scratching and gouging the asphalt along the way. About halfway through town he goes right by a couple of city cops. They drop their donuts and come out to ask him about this. "You didn't see me," he says, "and I was never here." And they nod and go back and sit in their prowl car and let him drag the boat the rest of the way through town. I can't believe it, but that's what they did. The Good Old Boy network at its best.
Half an hour, forty-five minutes later the city cops see Willis coming back without the boat. They never asked any questions.
Turns out Willis had sunk the boat in Lake Huron. Only the boat wouldn't burn, and it turned out it wouldn't sink either. The Coast Guard found this half-burned forty-foot wreck bobbing around in the Straits of Mackinac, right in the shipping lanes. It didn't take them any time at all to trace it back to Willis.
We tried to take him to court, but now he'd broken Federal laws too, and the Feds take precedence. Now he's got a date to appear in Federal court. Remember, this all started with a hundred-dollar blight ticket, right?
Willis never shows up in court. The US Marshall goes to his house and knocks on his door, and his wife says Willis has disappeared. She doesn't know where he went, or how, or who with. She says some guys from downstate were threatening him, and she thinks maybe they kidnapped or murdered him or something.
Well, what had happened was that Willis had this old school bus, and he loaded everything he owned in it, and hit the road. He's fleeing the Federal Government in an old school bus, and damned if he doesn't drive the thing all the way to Costa Rica. He's down there living in his school bus with an extension cord pulling power from some other guy's house, when he can find somebody who lets him. That's his life now.
One day he gets drunk and tells people he's on the run from the US Government for sinking a boat in Lake Huron. Which sounds like he's some kind of pirate, right? Guys he's with think he's full of crap, but one of them checks on the Internet and he finds that sure enough there's a Federal warrant for Willis. So he reports Willis to the local police. And now Willis is on the run again.
You gotta think they'd catch him if they wanted to. I mean, like Andy said, the guy's got to stick out a little, driving around Costa Rica in a huge yellow bus with CHEBAVOIX AREA SCHOOLS in eight-inch black letters down the side.
He can't come back. It's a hundred-dollar ticket that started all this, but now he's run from the Federal courts, and they'll put him in jail forever for that. And his wife will end up in jail too for lying to the US Marshall.
Sometimes you start with one silly little crime, and try to cover it up, and one thing leads to another, and you find yourself running from the law, driving a beat-up old school bus through the jungles three thousand miles from home, and heading for Brazil.
