Woman, 70, Arrested Over Dry Lawn

US woman arrested over dry lawn  

A 70-year-old US woman has been left bruised and bloody after an unexpected clash with police who came to caution her for not watering her lawn.
Trouble flared when Utah pensioner Betty Perry, 70, refused to give her name after being upbraided because her garden breached local regulations.

She says the officer hit her with handcuffs, cutting her nose, although police insist she slipped and fell.

Ms Perry said she was “distraught” after the incident.

He’s just trying to cover his tracks, as far as I’m concerned

Betty Perry

She denied accusations she was resisting arrest, maintaining that she only turned to go inside to call her son to fix the confusing dispute.

“I tried to sit down and get away from him [the police officer],” she told Utah newspaper the Daily Herald.

“I don’t know what he’s doing. I said: ‘What are you doing?’ And he hit me with those handcuffs in my face,” she said.

“He’s just trying to cover his tracks, as far as I’m concerned.”

Set free

The officer had judged that Ms Perry’s “sadly neglected and dying landscape” breached an Orem city guideline and was attempting to issue a formal caution when the 70-year-old was injured.

She was treated in a local hospital for the cut to her nose and for other bruises before being taken to jail.

But she was let go when police realised there were “other ways” of finding out her identity without jailing her, a police spokesman said

The arresting officer has not been named but has been placed on administrative leave, he added.

Ms Perry, who says she has never had a run-in with police in the past, has been offered help by local church leaders to clean up her garden.

“I’m very distraught over all this,” she said.

“I can’t believe this happened. Do you ever just wish you could start your day over and it would all be different?”

So we have cops hauling off a kid and tasering him because he made inflammatory remarks, arresting a fast food worker for assault with a salty weapon, and now arresting an old lady for a messy yard?

Yeah…

Bitchin’ avatar, by the way.

He should have tased her.

Good thing his name wasnt released… I could only imagine what the public would want to do to him- even if he is a cop. A 70 year old woman?! Holy fuck.

There are just some real fuckin idiots out there, NICE COLLAR, Bring him over to N.Y. for a night, our cops are gettin shot in the head fighting REAL CRIME, This bitch is pickin on old ladys !!!

[quote]pushharder wrote:
Here we fuckin’ go again. Reznor, are you ready?[/quote]

He’s too busy circle jerking, err, I mean ‘protecting’ society, with his other moronic cop buddies.

There’s no defense to this officer’s actions. Even if she was in violation of city guidelines I think it’s not only absurd to enforce it with an arrest it’s an abuse of power. If the officer wanted to issue a citation he could get her name from public records or just have left it with the verbal warning. Although elderly her age is irrelevant. Whether she was 70 or 30 the officer’s actions were shameful.

"The officer had judged that Ms Perry’s “sadly neglected and dying landscape” breached an Orem city guideline "

The “officer” seems to be an Orem city cop, so yep basically a step up from a mall security guard. Probably a Barney Fife type, scrambling to get his one bullet out of his pocket to apprehend this violent thug.

Oh my Barney
Oh my Barney
Had a jail
But couldn’t lock it
Had one bullet
For his pistol
Had to keep it
In his pocket

Well, this does prove there’s at least equal injustice in this country.

You guys are exactly right, because when the only side of story is given by a 70 year old woman it is 100% correct. This sounds like a convenient piece of journalistic sensationalism.

[quote]pushharder wrote:

Does ANYBODY think that Mr. Hancock, Mr. Adams, Mr. Jefferson, Mr. Morris, et al, would do anything other than roll over in their coffins and puke their dusty guts out if they thought anything like this would ever happen in the nation to which they pledged their lives, their fortunes and their sacred honor?[/quote]

No. All of the Founding Fathers have been rolling around for quite some time now.

[quote]Mick28 wrote:
At the root of this latest police atrocity are the ridiculous zoning laws enacted by many cities and towns across the country.

If the woman didn’t want to water her lawn that’s her business. It’s her lawn…her business. The Police had no right to even go to her house and discuss the issue with her.

I really wish that people would wake up and realize exactly what kind of society that we’re becoming. I sincerely hope the woman bankrupts the town with a multi million dollar law suit.

This might be the only way that police departments and local law makers wake up.

[/quote]

I think “latest police atrocity” betrays a very biased mindset, but the rest of your post was right on the mark.

I have been screaming for a long time about these bastards enacting 5 million regulations a month that encroach on private property rights. And Im a cop.

While this article seems pretty slanted, if it is the case that this guy, on his own accord, went to issue a summons to a 70 year old(or anybody) for a dry lawn, he should be stripped of his badge right now. He has no idea what it means to be a cop.

[quote]pushharder wrote:

And their intense distrust of a government vested with too much power was justified, wasn’t it?

[/quote]

Without a doubt.

This woman needs to move to Santa Rosa–the mayor would probably give her a medal.

We’ve got a huge push for cutting back on water usage lately, so we have the opposite problem–citizens are encouraged to squeal on neighbors who seem to be using “too much water” on their lawns. People are getting cited for letting water run off onto the sidewalk or for having ground that looks too wet.

One guy a few blocks from my house tore out his lawn and put in fake grass and a couple of mini-golf style ant-hills in front of his house.

[quote]Zap Branigan wrote:
He should have tased her.[/quote]

“Heh heh, use the TASER, THE TASER!! Meh heh heh”