It's one more and I'm free

thedailywhat:

All Locked Up And Nobody To Call of the Day: If you’re doing something that might land you jail time in Los Angeles County, keep a list of useful phone numbers handy.

67-year-old Stephen Petrick had to learn that lesson that hard way.

Petrick, a retiree, was arrested last year and charged with false imprisonment for keeping a pregnant heroin addict locked up in his house so she couldn’t leave to buy drugs.

Upon arrival at the L.A. County jail, Petrick was granted his one phone call, but was only allowed to use the jailhouse phone, which only made collect calls to landlines. Searching the recesses of his mind for the landline number of a friend, Petrick realized that he had become too dependent on his cellphone’s contact list and couldn’t remember a single one.

Making matters even worse, he wasn’t able to phone a bondsman to post his $150,000 bail, as no list of bail bondsmen was posted near the phones. When Petrick asked a deputy for assistance, he was told that giving him a number “would be showing partiality.”

“There was no way in hell for me to call anyone or to get a bondsman’s number,” Petrick said. “The phones in there effectively denied me the right to make bail, and I don’t know if many people know about this.”

L.A. County Sheriff’s Department spokeswoman Nicole Nishida confirmed the lack of a call sheet for bondsmen, and said the jail has “no plans” of adding one any time soon. Nishida says the Sheriff’s Department wants to avoid suggestion that it is showing favoritism toward particular bail bond businesses.

Petrick has since pled guilty to misdemeanor false imprisonment, receiving a sentence of three years probation. Asked about lessons learned from the incident, Petrick says he intends on carrying around and memorizing a bail bondsman’s number just in case.

“I don’t want to ever get stuck in jail like that again,” he says. “It was a nightmare.”

[laweekly / thehairpin.]

This is why you write phone numbers on your arms and various parts of your body.  Doesn’t everyone know that?

Filed under, “things Occupy has taught me.”

Also, three years probation for locking someone up? There are people in jail for nonviolent drug offenses.

Damn.