Essays - Night Court

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Way back in the hot summer of 1997, when Giuliani was in his Zero Tolerance phase, and folks were getting arrested for jaywalking, my American friend Louise and Australian friend Alissa and I decided to take an evening stroll, get a refreshing cold brewed beverage at the local deli and sit on the front doorstep of my building watching passers-by.

We were under the impression that if one wanted to drink a beer outside, it was perfectly legal if one kept it in a paper bag. This is true to an extent - (TAKE NOTE!) because police are not allowed to touch your property without a search warrant. However, if two folks come over, ask what you’re drinking, and you jovially say “beer!” and they turn out to be plain-clothed cops, you’ve got a wee problem. We were all legal age, so it could have been worse.

We each got a summons to Night Court, which oddly enough was for 8 AM. None of us wanted any trouble, so we were 15 minutes early, and were made to sleepily stand in line for a couple of hours with some few hundred other sleepy folks. At one point, an extremely pregnant lady tried to sit on the floor, and was barked at to stand back up again. That didn’t go over very well with any of us, but the barker was a 300 pound dude with two huge guns and a scary uniform, so we settled for sympathetic glances her way, and angry muttering. (As Louise has reminded me, the only thing to look at in that hallway was a circular sign with a slash through a drawing of a face in profile with the mouth open and germs coming out, with the words "COVER YOUR COUGHS" printed underneath it).

We were siphoned off into a sort of pew-lined classroom with about 50 other folks - the least offensive offenders, it turned out. There was an Annie Hall look-alike up front and a bailiff with lots of guns and head-hitting sticks on his belt, and I’d like to say whips, but it’s ages ago now and maybe I am dreaming things up.

For some reason, we were the only girls in the room. We sat together, and attendance was called. “Alberto Gonzalez” Annie yelled, and two men stood up so everyone started to giggle. The bailiff hollered at us all to shut up, but when three girlfriends are stuck in a room that is part classroom, part church, and all hilarious situation, the giggles have a way of coming to the fore unstoppably. One by one, the offenses were called. “Urinating In Public” got a few snorts out of us and a stern glance from the bailiff. “Unlawful Camping” seemed sort of funny at the time, and he came over to warn us to shut up. Finally, at “Unlawful Possession of Combustible Gas” when Alissa stage-whispered “what did he do, fart?” we lost it completely. We were screamed at that we would be sent to jail immediately if we couldn’t control ourselves.

Naturally, we could no longer look at each other. After lots of fake (covered, of course) coughing and sneezing, we finally paid our 10 dollars, which seemed a little better than the alternative one day in jail. (Louise recalls: “I was insulted when the judge announced that i was being charged for an illegal open container of ROLLING ROCK... Rolling Rock?!?!!!!! As if!!! it took all of my self-control to not shout, "it was NOT a Rolling Rock, your Honor! I don't drink that piss-water! I had an Anchor Steam!!!")

Well, the summons was erased, so we have no criminal records from enjoying ourselves for 5 minutes on a hot summer night.

Alissa later found out that Giuliani had a certain quota of arrests/summons that each officer was required to make each month, and we were caught on the last day. It probably would have been $20 for jaywalking, or, say, two days in jail, so we figured we got off easy.

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