PINE – According to a complaint filed on the afternoon of Sept. 24, a young fellow tooling home from school along Rock Creek Road felt unfairly chastised when a man standing on the deck of a house at the corner of Upper Ranch Drive made an offensive gesture toward him as he passed by. When he stopped to ask what prompted the discourtesy, the non-verbally expressive fellow promptly told him in plain – if inflammatory – English. “I saw you drifting around the corner the other night. If I see you do it again, I’ll throw a rock through your window, you (vulgar adjective, cruel epithet).” When the unhappy lad related the incident to his mom a few minutes later, she called JCSO, and in short order a pair of deputies dropped by the Upper Ranch Drive address for a little tete-a-tete-a-tete. While the hot-tempered homeowner “appeared angry,” he seemed perfectly willing to answer the officers’ questions, albeit at the top of his lungs, and loudly denied any knowledge of the incident. Then he asked to be spared further interview. “Are you charging me with something?” he shouted. “THEN LEAVE NOW!” The deputies left.

PINE – Long after dark, a South Elk Creek Road resident called to complain of loud music emanating from the woods near their home. Following the lively beat some 25-yards through the forest, two sheriff’s deputies came upon a jeep parked in the creek with its nose pointing at the stars. “Yeah, I just slipped backwards,” explained the driver, seated nonchalantly behind the precariously tilted wheel. Nearly invisible beneath the stranded vehicle’s chassis, his only passenger was apparently attempting emergency repairs on a “broken 4-wheel-drive linkage.” While interviewing the driver, a highly-trained officer detected the three principal indicators of alcohol intoxication – bloodshot eyes, slurred speech, and an open bottle of Crown Royal in the back seat. After miserably failing creekside maneuvers, the high-living driver was arrested on suspicion of DUI. “I was just trying to get home,” he lamented.

The deputy dispatched to Kinney Creek Road at about 11 p.m. faced the unusual task of locating a car that was both missing and not missing. While the woman reporting the non-theft clearly did not have possession of her red Subaru Baja, she was certain that her head-strong boyfriend did. And while her boyfriend definitely didn’t have her permission to take the car, she believed he might be under the impression that he did. And though the absent Baja was due to be repossessed any time now, it wasn’t insured and she feared her sweetheart might get in trouble if pulled over. Long story slightly shorter, she wanted the car declared missing but not stolen, and wanted her boyfriend found but not arrested. Probably conflicted, the officer left the runaway Romeo several cell-phone messages before pronouncing the case both closed and not open.

CONIFER – The woman awaiting sheriff’s deputies in the parking lot of Aspen Creek Hardware on the afternoon of Aug. 26 was seeing red about paint. It seems that a can of interior paint she’d purchased at Aspen Creek didn’t quite match a batch she’d bought elsewhere. Rather than giving her the refund she requested, she said, the store owner “swept the paint off the counter with great force.” Convinced that the owner had intended to do her injury, she fled the store and dialed 911. In his defense, the owner said that when he tried to discuss the matter with his aggrieved customer she’d become “quite agitated,” loudly demanding that he assume the cost of having her dining room professionally painted. Seeing no satisfactory solution forthcoming, he asked the woman to leave and, as he pushed the controversial can toward her, it caught the edge of the counter’s plastic spill cover, tipped over and rolled onto the floor. “You threw that at me!” he remembered her yelling. “I’m calling 911!” As the owner’s testimony blended smoothly with that of another store employee, and as the can of contention suffered no serious harm, the deputy declined to pursue the case and cautioned the woman that returning to the store would be a trespass that could land her in stir.

PINE JUNCTION – Rushing to quash a brawl at a pizza parlor/saloon on Mount Evans Boulevard, officers arrived at about 8 p.m. to find one of the combatants sitting outside, all alone within a pungent cloud of gloom and his own alcoholic exhalations. Since the officers could wring no useful information from Suspect No. 1, they went inside to chat with an employee, who said that the unsteady fellow out front had been peacefully drinking himself happy when Suspects No. 2 and No. 3 entered at about 7 o’clock. They identified themselves by first names and claimed to be Denverites, which, by itself, is not an actionable offense. On the other hand, one of the strangers walked across the bar and, for no obvious reason, stuck a finger in No. 1’s beer and then slurped it down without so much as a “please” or “thank you.”  The fractious flatlanders then verbally badgered No. 1 until he invited them out to the parking lot to explain their discourtesies. Alas, No. 2 and No. 3 were long gone by the time deputies arrived, and a check of the area found no trace of their red pickup or bad attitudes. Since the employee helpfully volunteered to look after No. 1 for the rest of the evening, officers cleared the scene without further ado.