"The Crackheads" Hit My Block But "Jane" Runs Them Off

Flickr.com photo, generic crack heads.

Because a malfunctioning gas gauge left me high and dry, I holed up inside my "3016" property at about 4 a.m. after an uneventful night patrol. At 8:30 a.m., my neighbor "Jane" (one of the decent people on my southern perimeter) knocked on my door, urgently...

"I saw your car," she said, as I answered in a groggy state. "So I figured you were here."

I blabbered something about my gas gauge, but all I wanted to know was "what's up?"

The Minn Post story dubbed her "Jane," so that's the name I'm going to use. Jane and I now share keys to the back gate of the property next door to her, which Jane is watching to make sure it doesn't turn into a "squat" for "crack heads."

I've picked up Jane's habit of referring to all North Side enemies as "the crack heads." Certainly, Jane is not the only North Sider who habitually speaks of "the crack heads" as a generic army of bad guys, always looking for an opportunity to strike.

"The crack heads" will steal the copper pipes. If a door is kicked in, soon "the crack heads" will be using the place for a squat. Etcetera.

Crack Heads Get Into Another Garage On My Block

"The crack heads were breaking into the garage on the corner," Jane explained.

"Corner?" I asked. "What corner?"

"The Mexican house," Jane clarified.

"It's an empty house?" I asked, because I wasn't aware of any Mexican family on the block or the perimeter.

Jane nodded. Her innocent expressiveness is childlike, for example the way she does a "big nod" like a bobble head doll.

"But Mexicans used to live there?" I asked.

Big nod.

Only the night before I had been using "Google Maps" to walk down my "virtual street," viewing my yard as it had once appeared with lush grass, seeing houses which had been torn down before I ever arrived. (Google needs to update the map for 6th Street North!) And the Google camera had photographed a large family around the yard of that very house. They had indeed appeared Mexican.

Or was it a different house? I was groggy. Nothing summarizes the disorientation created by endless vacant houses so well as Jacob's Minn Post video, when we're carrying a board to secure a door and I exclaim "We're at the wrong (expletive) house!"

Running Off The Crack Heads

Jane blurted out the whole story rapidly. A little while ago, somebody had gotten into the garage at "the Mexican house," which is 430 N. 6th Street, where an inoperable white truck is jacked up on blocks (just waiting to fall on a child, Jane said) and the back window is open to trespass, no easy way to secure it because it's all cinder block.

"The crack heads" had opened the front of the garage somehow...and, incredibly, they were parking their car inside next to the inoperable white truck for some unknown reason. I think Jane once mentioned she has binoculars.

Jane said the police finally showed up in Squad 424. They scrutinized the car parked in the garage, now with the garage door closed. Then they left, leaving the garage door up.

What are they doing? Jane wondered. They're just going to leave? With the garage door up like that?

After a while, with police nowhere in sight, the crack heads came back. Jane figured the police were not going to do anything and were only useful as a threat in this situation, so little Jane the "personal care assistant" (who sometimes wears "Sponge Bob" scrubs) went to confront the crack heads herself.

"You're not supposed to be here!" she declared, grasping her cell phone in her hand. "Nobody is supposed to be in this garage. I've called the police. They've got your license plate number."

"The crack heads" didn't offer explanation or excuses. They just got in their vehicle and left. (Wisconsin license plate 382-LVJ, a tan four-door, perhaps a Taurus)

I wish Jane had gone to my house more quickly, while I slumbered and the crack heads were doing their thing just two houses away. But I was amazed by her boldness. I must admit, after hearing how Jane was under siege from the intimidating drug-dealing "corner boys," hanging out in front of her house day after day, I had serious doubts whether Jane was psychologically able to take bold action. I had even hesitated to dub the block on my southern perimeter "Jane's block," because Jane seemed so afraid and I didn't want (even by implication) to ask too much of her.

Well, no more! I've seen Jane's character, now. She is emboldened by the fact somebody is standing with her against "the army of crack heads."

We figured out the deal with the garage...some kind of bolt had been undone. It was going to be a hard one to secure. Out of habit, (and still a bit groggy) I dialed 311.

"It's Saturday," Jane said. "311 doesn't answer on Saturday."

(Expletive)

Yet Another Break-In, Peter And Joy's Block

She had more urgent concerns, now that "the crack heads" had been run off from the garage at "the Mexican house," and the police at least had their license plate. Jane had seen somebody break into the massive white house at 3000 Lyndale Ave. N., a couple of black guys. She'd called 911 on it, but nobody had been apprehended. They might be in the house right now, she said.

"I'll go check it," I said. "That's another one we'll have to call 311 about on Monday."

So I checked it. The back door was open, but there were no prints in the snow we received last night. (April 27! Unbelievable! I remember the April 15 blizzard in 1987, the night America bombed Libya, and my brother tells the legend of a foot and a half of snow on the ground when he awoke on May Day, 1994, but this is officially the latest snow I've seen in my life)

In the yard, I noticed a lawn ornament which had once held (I would assume) a statue of the Virgin Mary. But whoever had owned the house took the Mother of Jesus Christ with them when they left. Or maybe it's possible to get a few bucks for crack by selling a statue of the Virgin Mary. Who knows?

Inside 3000 Lyndale Ave. N, I could see a big white oven pulled loose and on its side in the middle of the kitchen. I ventured inside no further. I didn't want to encounter the person or persons who had manhandled a large oven like that, while I was armed with nothing but a Craft hammer and cell phone. And, besides, I noticed an "REO" sign on the window with the number of the real estate agent. I am less inclined to waltz right in when there is "exterior contact information" posted on the property. Somebody is still nominally taking care of the property. It is not "abandoned," and so I am less inclined to seize "necessary authority" over it under the official (but vague) "adopt these houses" city mandate.

I called REO. Naturally, being Saturday, I couldn't talk to a live person. I left a message I figured would be answered on Monday, and fretted aloud on their voice mail about whether anything of value would remain in the house over the weekend. I called the 4th Precinct and left a message for Officer Jackson about the troubling situation at the two properties. The officer who took the message pressed for details. Was anybody inside 3000 RIGHT NOW?

I hadn't gone inside. I didn't know for sure, sir.

I told myself I would have to explain to Jane how helpful it was to call the real estate companies if their information was posted to the property. Maybe Jane already knows that, but it would be helpful to have the conversation and, besides, the little REO sign in a side window wasn't very visible. I had been by the property before, but not noticed it until today.

Off To My Oh-So-Safe Campus

I got some gas. I drove to school to complete oodles of homework.

Only last night in Dinkytown I tried to assist some college girl with a sprained knee, crying out in pain, while two horny college guys kept insisting on an oh-so-helpful "piggy back ride."

"Have you done this before?" another drunken girl asked while I checked the reddened knee. "Do you know about this stuff?"

I explained I was an army medic. Used to be, I clarified. Used to be.

After examining her knee--sloppy snow flakes falling all around--I assured the dear girl it was most likely sprained, probably not dislocated as she had feared. She should go inside The Steak Knife and put some ice on it. I explained to the "horn dog tag team" how to grasp wrists form a "fireman's basket" by grasping their wrists together, so they could both carry her safely to a vehicle. (I think it's called a "fireman's basket." In any case, I learned it from my little Boy Scout handbook)

One of the young men had an impatient, knowing grin.

"Don't smirk at me," I snapped at him. "Your friend is injured. Fun time is over. That knee is going to swell up like a melon tomorrow. You need to get her some help."

He got serious. He said he would take care of it.

I bit my tongue to avoid saying, "Try not to date rape her while you ice the knee." It would have been an unfair remark and, more importantly, would have aggravated the situation. He was, after all, at least trying to help her.

Outside "The Library" Bar and Grill, I almost called 911 on two different confrontations both getting set to boil into fistfights. In both cases, weak-wristed little blows were thrown without making contact, and drunken young men faced off at long distances, shouting taunts, while friends with more sense kept them apart.

Yeah...today I'll write that opinion column about the need to pull "party patrols" out of the University District and drop more cops on the North Side.