[Vision2020] Police Get Calls About Bikinis, TV Remotes

[Tom Hansen]

>From the Associated Press -

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Police Get Calls About Bikinis, TV Remotes

Rexburg, Idaho - Law enforcement agencies depend on citizens in the
community to be their eyes and ears. But officials in this southeastern
Idaho town aren't sure how to respond to reports of skimpy bikinis, lost TV
remotes, menacing squirrels, and a report of a neighbor's shrub trespassing.

"You try to help, you don't want to seem uncaring," said Randy Lewis, a
captain with the Rexburg Police Department.

Those kinds of calls come in daily to the police, including one where Lewis
ended up using a lasso to capture a hissing badger running loose in an
apartment.

"What a mistake," he said. "It about drug me off."

Even though many calls don't fall within what police normally do, officers
still respond to complaints of loitering ducks and children who won't mind
their parents.

Lewis said the Rexburg police probably get more of those types of calls than
larger departments.

"We don't have a high frequency of serious crimes, though we do have
murders, rapes, child molestations and bank robberies," Lewis said. "Thank
goodness they don't happen every day."

Rexburg Police Lt. Ron Larson said he thinks many of the calls are caused by
residents not knowing the difference between civil and criminal offenses.

"It might not have anything to do with the police, but they don't know who
else to call," he told the Post Register.

Most of the unusual calls come during the summer, he said, and already the
department has fielded calls about mean notes taped to trash bins and
reports of residents receiving offers of being hypnotized over the phone.

Lewis said the hypnotist calls could be coming from students at Brigham
Young University-Idaho as part of their homework.

But a university official said he is not aware of any class requiring that
type of assignment.

Meanwhile, Rexburg police will continue to take the calls in stride.

"We don't want to discourage anyone from calling in," Lewis said.

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Seeya round town, Moscow.

t hansen-moore
Moscow, Idaho


"Life should NOT be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving
safely in an attractive and well preserved body, but rather to skid in
sideways, chocolate in one hand, a drink in the other, body thoroughly used
up, totally worn out and screaming 'WOO HOO. What a ride!'"