Speaking of mountain warfare, a long-suffering woman walked into JCSO’s mountain substation on June 23 to see a (police) man about a horse. Her unhappy tale began three years ago, when an otherwise inoffensive female moved in across the street from her Upper Bear Creek home and immediately suggested the complainant sell her a portion of her property. Though an essential social lubricant, neighborliness can be pressed too far and she refused to give ground, which in no way discouraged the new gal on the block from taking improper liberties with the complainant’s hay field. Shortly after moving in, the neighbor held a house party and had her guests park their cars on that lush acreage, and on numerous occasions her son and his dogs have been observed romping destructively through the hay. On each occasion, the complainant called the neighbor to explain that the meadow is neither a parking lot nor playground, but a functioning hay field that’s more easily harvested when not stomped flat. The last straw came on June 19, when she learned that the woman’s horses were contentedly munching on her ripening silage. “I ran out of hay up above and brought them down,” said the neighbor, by way of explanation. The complainant asked her to remove the beasts from her field and, the next day, posted “No Trespassing” signs around the crop. Not long after, the presumptuous horsewoman left a baleful message on her answering machine, which she played for the deputies. “Thank you for the signs you put on your fence, they’re really attractive. I’m going to call the county and report all of the diseased trees and voles in your yard. I love the elk coming through, leaving excrement in the yard. The war is on.” While the complainant said she didn’t want to “make trouble” for her neighbor, she didn’t want to let her threats go undocumented, either.

On the evening of June 21, an exasperated fellow called JCSO hoping to file a harassment complaint against a bothersome neighbor. According to his complaint, he and a nearby homeowner had maintained an uneasy DEFCON 3 for some time, but he felt he’d been pushed to battle-stations earlier that day when he began mowing his lawn and his noisome nemesis strolled over to watch the entire process at close range. Just as he finished the chore, the neighbor muttered something about his yard presenting a “wildfire hazard” in a tone that the target perceived as “derogatory”. Given that the complainant never actually ordered the man off of his property, the pesky neighbor’s unhelpful behavior was more irritating than illegal, and the responding deputy judged a harassment charge unwarranted. The cold war continues.

Returning home to a violent and bloody scene late on the evening of June 20, a young Alabraska Lane woman’s frantic summons brought deputies a-runnin’. After certifying the house un-lurked, officers heard the following account. With her parents out of town, the restless teen had invited her boyfriend over to “hang out” and, while he tinkered with his jeep in the driveway, she buzzed off to a local grocery where she met a pair of old high school chums who were also eager to “hang out.” Together, the carefree foursome “hanged out” at her house until about 10 p.m. when the boyfriend went home in compliance with a court-ordered curfew and the daughter of the house drove her classmates back to the market. Back home, she was alarmed to discover the taillights of her boyfriend’s jeep alight and a big smash-mark in the garage door where the vehicle had apparently rammed head-long into it. Her apprehension deepened when, scoping the premises, she found a shattered framed photograph on her bedroom floor and – horrors! – one of her two cherished pet rats “ripped in half.” Competent and perceptive deputies soon apprehended perfectly rational explanations for all the carnage. As a deputy poked around the garage, the jeep’s starter motor began cranking, moving the vehicle forward of its own accord. From this the officer deduced that the boyfriend’s inexpert disassembly of the steering column left a recurring ignition short that obviated the need for key or driver. As to the broken picture, the boyfriend admitted to officers over the phone that he’d accidentally knocked it to the floor and shattered it, but thoughtfully chose not to trouble his sweetie about it. And the bisected rodent? Big surprise – the boyfriend again. Contrary to his girlfriend’s strict instructions that the pair remain forever estranged, he’d put them in a cage together where one, perhaps disgusted by the other’s revolting sanitary habits, messily partitioned its cellmate. Confronted by the evidence, the girl seemed both relieved and a wee bit sheepish. “I guess no one broke in, huh?” she said.

EVERGREEN – A young pedestrian strode into JCSO’s mountain substation bright and early on June 22 to report the theft of his bicycle and point the finger at the possible thief. He said he’d purchased the economical conveyance last Christmas but hadn’t gotten around to riding it until quite recently – just in time, it seems, for somebody to snatch it from his porch. Fortuitously, during his hike down to the cop-shop he’d spied a male person wearing a baseball cap and dark-colored hoodie pedaling west along Buffalo Park Road atop what appeared to be his missing velocipede. Confronting the rider, he asked if the man “wanted to confess something.” The man didn’t, of course, but did “appear nervous” while explaining that he’d received the brand-new bicycle as a gift “a couple years ago.” Lacking concrete proof of the cyclist’s guilt, the complainant could do little but watch him ride away and hope that sheriff’s deputies could collar the crook based on his description of the stolen vehicle and its presumed stealer. Alas, until more evidence comes to light, investigators are just spinning their wheels.

CONIFER – On the evening of June 11, a very small rancher asked JCSO for help returning a very small animal to his very small spread. According to Ol’ MacDonald’s statement, his male pigmy goat fled the dell on June 9 and was recovered by an area couple later that same day. He knew that because the couple left him a phone message on June 9 requesting that he retrieve the brown and white vagrant forthwith, followed by another to the effect that they weren’t running a barnyard B&B and had farmed the furry fugitive out to a woman at an un-named local feed store. Unable to contact the critter’s reluctant rescuers regarding its precise whereabouts, JCSO left it up to the animal’s owner to find out who got his goat.