Another reason not to smoke.

One night—while working in Houston—a bunch of us went out for dinner. This one guy didn't come along—he stayed at the hotel and ate dinner from his grocery stash. He's a smoker, so after dinner he walked a few doors down to the CVS to get a pack of smokes. (CVS is the Long's Drug Store of the East, and apparently of Texas too.) He's a nice guy, a little quiet, keeps to himself at first but is real funny once he gets going.

Anyway, he didn't have any cash, and was hoping to use a check to get cigarettes and a few other things. (The hotel we were staying at doesn't give you any shampoo, and not quite enough soap.) But the guy behind the counter says, "Not if the check is from out of town." Crap, he's from out of state. So he says, "I'll go get some money and I'll be right back."

The bank, with an ATM, is down a few more doors. So he gets some cash. He's just about to go back into the CVS when four cop cars scream up, surround him, and the cops throw him on the hood with the shoving and the yelling and the "shut the fuck up" and the handcuffs... the whole deal.

This guy is totally terrified, but keeps saying to himself, "It'll be ok, they'll let me go, it's ok, this is a mixup, it'll all work out." Finally, this undercover cop walks out of the CVS in plain clothes but with a badge/pin on his chest. He walks right up to our guy sprawled on the hood of the car, and leans forward to look him in the face. Thankfully, the undercover cop, without hesitation said, "Yeah, that's him."

Wait a second. What? I mean, what?!?!

Now it's time for "You have the right to remain silent," and we're gonna shove you in the back seat of the car, and "You just sit there and shut the fuck up."

One of the windows is down a little bit, and he can hear the radio chatter, which includes, "Suspect is armed, repeat, suspect is armed." Now he's somewhere between a nightmare and 1984, or a nightmare about 1984.

All he can think about now is the fact that he's going to jail, for something bad involving a gun, in Texas.

Well he sits in the back seat for almost a half hour before a cop gets into the driver's seat and they start driving. He doesn't know Texas at all, so he doesn't know where he's going. They drive him around for about 15 minutes before he realizes they are pulling back up to the CVS. The cop gets out and opens the back door. "Now listen son, they took a look at the security video of the parking lot, and they say that the guy who committed the armed robbery in front of the CVS wasn't you. I hope you understand that we have to take certain precautions." Somehow I think they are legally required not to apologize in situations like this. I'm serious, it must be like how you're not supposed to apologize after a car accident even if it's your fault, or why governments never apologize for their screw ups even if they just killed a bunch of civilians, god forbid everyone starts apologizing for their mistakes, we wouldn't need lawyers anymore or something. Someone explain this one to me?

Anyway, our guy holds out his hands, "Can we do this without the handcuffs?" Admittedly a pretty ballsy comment for a young liberal, to a Texas cop, when he's just happier than shit that he isn't going to the Texas big-house tonight. They uncuff him, the cop cars drive straight away, and he's left alone in the parking lot thinking, "Oh my god! There's still an armed robber around here somewhere!"
Ultimately, thank god for the surveillance camera! Holy cow! I mean where was the victim? How long would it have taken to arrange a lineup back at the station if they hauled him all the way down there?

The story is that someone got robbed in the parking lot. They ran into the CVS, and told the manager it was a medium build white guy with a knit cap. The manager calls the cops. An off duty, or undercover, or whatever, cop is in the CVS, he says, "I saw that guy, he was just in here." The real robber makes a clean getaway, and our man gets nabbed, positively ID'd by a cop as "the guy who was just in the store."


A desperate need for cigarettes outweighs fear of armed robbery, so our friend goes back into the CVS to, finally, get a pack of smokes. Well, as soon as he goes in the door, the folks behind the counter see him and turn white. One woman actually dives under the counter! Our guy starts going, "Oh my god, wait, no, seriously, it wasn't me, they just let me go." Luckily the manager and the undercover cop are still chatting in the back of the store. They hear the commotion and come up and save him. "No, it's ok, it was a mistake, this isn't the guy," and the manager gives him a free pack of cigarettes.

I think he should have turned them down in exchange for a pack of gum. Man, that was your chance to quit smoking, then and there.