I Remember Bring Arrested For Trying To Tell The Police "Hey You Can't Do That!!!"

There I was, big time frat man back in the day.
A group of my brothers who were renting a house way down on the Southside of Pittsburgh. Near campus there is the standard student housing. The next ring of housing consists of upper classmen and young urban professionals. Both of these groups are seeking to shift away from the college lifestyle but want to maintain some connectedness to it.

Then you had the place where this group of frat brothers decided to live. It was in the next ring of houses. This is where settled people lived in a real neighborhood. Needless to say they were not pleased that we decided to have a party.

I recall that the party was on every level of the house. The top floor, the main floor and the basement. The DJ was on the top floor. The keg and all of the drinks was in the kitchen.

I was having a good time. Then there was a knock on the door. The police had received a report that several neighbors had complained about the loud music. They asked us to keep it down or they were going to shut the party down. We complied for a hot minute.

30 minutes later the cops returned. They entered into the house and notified us that the party was over.

STRIKE 1: I saw them entering into the house. After growing up watching cop shows I figured that they didn't have a search warrant and thus they could not enter our house. Still to this day I recall a White male cop with a brown mustache. A Black female cop and then a blond haired White female cop. I protested "You all can't just walk into our house like this". The cop told me "Shut up!". I thought that all of my boys were going to back me up. Nothing.

STRIKE 2: I saw the White female cop TAKING THE TAP to our keg. I said to her. "You can't take that. We rented it and we'll have to pay for it". Again the cop said to me "I told you to be quiet. If I hear you again I am going to take you around the corner for the night".

STRIKE 3: I saw the Black female cop take the power cord to the turntable. Once again (since it was my turntable): "You can't take that........"

Then the cop said "That's it!!". I tried to run out of the front door and he had collared me up.

I figured that he was going to put me into the back of the wagon and let me out around the corner. I thought wrong.

My boys figured that they were taking me to the precinct around the corner in South Oakland. They all gathered together to get me out. Wrong. They were told that I wasn't getting out of jail for the night.

They took me downtown and had me locked up for the night.
The charge? Public Drunkenness.

I was buzzed but not drunk.
In truth they locked me up to shut me up.

I was mad more than anything else.

I recall scheming on how I was going to break out of that cage the minute that I stepped in.

I recall some drug addict White guy who was hyper all night long being in the cell with about 9 other people including me.

I don't remember much else from that night.

I do recall being let out and seeing the welcoming face of my girlfriend at the time and one of her friends to take me home.

I learned my lesson that night.

• The cops don't need a search warrant to break up a party and do what they need to do to assure that it remains broken up.
• Make sure you abide by the neighborhood norms when it comes to parties (We should have invited some of the elderly neighbors to the party)
• Don't try to hold a "civil rights protest"........alone