When you work with a proactive shift you don’t often have many “slow nights”. I was part of a very productive shift and usually only had one or two “quiet” days a week. My SGT. Chef called me and said “hey, we keep getting reports of a stolen car in this area, let’s try to find it. Since I had nothing going on and I was all caught up on reports, I agreed. We drove through the area for about 20 minutes without finding anything. Chef called an end to the search and we began to leave the location. As I drove by a car dealership I saw something I couldn’t believe. There was a naked lady with blond hair sitting in one of the cars for sale on the lot. She was just staring at me and I did the same to her in total disbelief. I got on the radio and said “copy a suspicious person … it’s a naked white female…” Chef wasn’t far behind so he was at the location in no time. We went over to the car and the naked lady got out of the vehicle and said; “hello.” She was standing there without a care that she was butt naked. She also seemed to struggle to open her mouth and when she spoke it was extremely garbled. This is typically an indication of drug usage and usually, the drugs would be meth. For some reason usage of meth causes the jaw muscles to tighten, which results in the grinding of teeth by users.
The woman introduced herself as Belinda and Chef asked the obvious question that we were both thinking of. “What are you doing?” Belinda responded “I’m looking at cars. I may buy one.” “Ma’am it’s two o’clock in the morning,” I responded. “So?” Belinda replied. Behind Belinda was a Dunkin doughnuts jacket. “Please grab the jacket I said to her.” Belinda picked up the jacket and just held it in her hand. She then began to say that she lives in Atlanta but doesn’t want to go home. As she was talking about how she ended up in a car, she just held the jacket in one hand. “Belinda please put on the jacket!” I had to tell her. Then Chef asked her; “Uhhh Belinda do you work at Dunkin’ doughnuts?” “No” she replied. “Where did you get the jacket from?” Belinda then began to scream but mumbled that she found it in a trashcan. We decided not to push the issue of where the jacket came from so Chef asked where she put her remaining clothes. “Behind the building.” Replied Belinda. “Why are they behind the building?” was his follow-up question. Belinda once again just stared at him. Chef sighed, looked at me, and said “I’ll go look for the clothes.” While I waited Belinda just looked around and made these weird grunting sounds. A few minutes later Chef returned covered in mud all the way to his knees. “I couldn’t find your clothes,” he said. Belinda looked at Chef and said “they are behind the building” while grinding her teeth and staring at Chef. We just looked at each other, and with exasperation, chef said “take her.” I walked up to Belinda and said, “put your hands behind your back.”
Belinda began to curse and hurl racial slurs at me but nevertheless complied with everything I said. A few minutes later we were on our way to the jail. When I returned, Chef and I spoke about the incident. We both didn’t want to take Belinda to jail but we had no other option. She was naked, clearly high, trespassing and stealing Dunkin Doughnut jackets. The jail was the safest place for her and those around her.
A few months later I saw Belinda in court. She was speaking clearly and was very calm. As it turned out, the jail was the best thing for her that night.
Posted here first [https://ourstoriesfrombehindthebadge.wordpress.com/2022/05/01/naked-and-not-afraid/]