Halloween, Part 7 - The FINAL Chapter

So – there we were – the elevator doors were closing and we were almost free. But – we could hear all the cop cars skidding to a stop just a few yards away. We could see all the flashing lights and hear all the sirens and the radios. Dang! – Those security guards had it going on!

And this is where the security guar… uh… we realized by now that they were indeed full-fledged cops – made a move right out of the movies. Just as the elevator doors were about to clamp shut, a hand slipped between the doors and pulled them open. Now here’s the situation. One cop vs. 7 very tall, very scary, football-like, spike encrusted gloved and helmeted, white masked, red-glowing-eyed guys. We are TOTALLY scared and freaked out, but he can’t see that. I’ll never forget how he slowly moved his hand to his piece – didn’t pull it – but he had it there in case.

He backed up a little bit and very deliberately told us to “exit the elevator, slowly”. Within a couple of seconds, the place was literally swarming with cops and we were basically lined up against the wall being searched. “But, we we’re just having fun!” …we kept saying. “It’s just a joke”, “We just wanted to have some fun…”

They were NOT amused. In what seemed like only a couple of minutes we were all sitting down and listening the cops telling us how much trouble we were in. They had us strip off our skates, gloves, masks and helmets. We didn’t think that things could get much worse, when someone who was obviously in charge appeared on the scene. It turned out that the Chief of Police for the Port of Seattle Police was called out of bed at 2:00 am and he was NOT happy. He proceeded to pace back and forth before us letting us know that he could have us thrown in jail right now. That there were a dozen different offenses he could charge us for.
I have never heard such a combination of language and anger… it didn’t help that we kept talking about “…just having fun”. We soon stopped saying anything and started to just apologize. It was a very long night.

We ended up getting cited for disorderly conduct. We had to walk away from the airport (they confiscated our gear), and then we finally got in touch with our van driver who came and picked us up. We ended up having to get a public defender, going to court and being sentenced to 20 hours of community service work. Of course it could have been a lot worse, but the whole thing was a real eye-opener and kind of surreal.

The fun and ironic ending to this was that we ended up having to wash and wax the very police cars that chased us in the parking garage. It was kind of fun to have the secretaries whispering and excitedly chatting when we showed up the first day. Our little escapade ended up being quite the story around the police office for quite awhile.

So there you have it. Probably the hardest part was telling my folks because I had always been a good kid. Fortunately, they were pretty understanding overall. It’s one of those things that I am actually glad I did. We didn’t cause any harm, hurt anyone or destroy any property. Of course, it’s been a great story to be able to tell over the years, we did have fun through it all, and it was fun to be a part of something bigger than myself.

Thanks for sticking with me on this, and I hope you’ve enjoyed reading this story. I’ve had a great time reliving and retelling it, and actually writing down the memories. Have a fun, safe and legal Halloween!