Where is everyone #5

Not familiar with tater sausage myself, hopefully someone will chime in…..

 

If anyone would know it would be @cke — but he’s been busy and I don’t want to bother him with something like that

 

That was my thought.

 

I believe divisible only applies to weight.

 

After I had the shattiest week of my trucking life and potentially the worst experience I have ever had I decided after a couple of days of thinking and collecting my thoughts I decided I would share this in hopes that no other driver or owner operator would have to go through what happened to me.

Last Friday I snagged a hot flatbed load from Corpus Christi to Fort Carson Colorado. I was headed to Houston from McAllen to grab my step deck but this military load popped up for good money and I took it. I need to put some tires on my flatbed so I stopped by the shop and mounted up 4 tires and hit the road.

Fast forward to Tuesday morning at 10:00am and my arrival to Fort Carson Gate #3. This is where things start to go SOUTH in a hurry. I had never been to Fort Carson so they have to perform the standard background check as expected. After an hour and twenty minutes the MP along with a Fort Carson Traffic Unit officer approach the truck and ask me to get out. At this point I am thinking this is odd but I wasn't concerned at all. The officer from the Fort Carson Traffic Unit tells me I have a warrant in Colorado and he has to take me in to custody. Now this is where I get concerned and confusion sets in. How in the H-ELL do I have a warrant in the state of Colorado? From when? Why didn't it show up when I just renewed my CDL? How have I been allowed on to every single military installation I have ever tried to enter to make a pickup or delivery? This is making no sense to me because I was just on the base in Herlong, CA at the end May before I had back surgery and I was on an AFB in Delaware in March. I also renewed my TWIC Card back in January.

I ask what the warrant is for and the only thing the officer can tell me is that it is for a failure-to-appear. Huh? What did I fail to appear for in the state of Colorado? At this point everything feels like a big mistake or misunderstanding. I ask the officer if he is kidding or joking and unfortunately he was not. So, here I am, at the barricade to enter Fort Carson with my truck and a pair of military containers on the deck and I am 750 miles from home and I am going to jail. I ask the officer if I can move my truck so it doesn't get towed and he tells me and the MP's that my truck can stay in the lane at the gate because this is a simple warrant where I will be taken in to custody and transported to the jail and talk to the judge and get a new court date and I shouldn't be gone that long. He even tells me that the MP's will wait at the jail with me to give me a ride back to my truck. That struck me as odd. I asked about which jail I was being transported to and he tells me El Paso County Jail in Colorado Springs. How convenient that it's only 4.6 miles away from Gate 3. I was allowed to lock up the truck and call my wife and the broker to give them an update on my situation. Then, I was handcuffed at Gate 3 and put in the back of a Military Police vehicle and taken to jail by an MP. The MP driving said he had never done this before and he had to call a supervisor for instructions. Off we go to the El Paso County Jail in Colorado Springs. As we arrive and go through the booking process the desk clerk tells me that she doesn't have a citation in my name or under my driver's license number or social security number, only a failure-to-appear from Salida County Colorado from January 2017. What? Then it popped in to my head because I was given a roadside Level 1 Inspection after sliding around on the ice and snow while empty and I received a warning on the inspection for failure to maintain my lane but I was not given a citation by the inspecting officer. After the booking clerk does some research about the failure-to-appear I was finally told it was because of the warning I received during the inspection. Again, what is happening? A desk Sargent gets involved in the booking process and he is asking a supervisor for permission to let me go because he is afraid that they may be breaking the law by detaining and holding me for a failure-to-appear when I was never cited by law enforcement. The supervisor says I can pay the bond and go and handle it with the court at a later date or I can sit in jail and wait to be arraigned by the judge. I tell the desk Sargent I will pay the bond and handle it with the court. How much is my bond? $500.00 + $40.00 in administrative fees. Great. Can I pay it right now? Do you have $540.00 in cash or a cashier's check or money order? I have my debit card. Sorry, nope. You can't pay that way. Ugh, great.

Now, my saving grace of this situation was that I had someone in Colorado Springs just 10 minutes away from the jail that could come and pay my bond in cash. Another driver I know called me Friday and asked if I could deliver his load for him at Fort Carson when I was empty because he was denied entry to the base due to something in his background check from 17 years ago. He knew I was right behind him for delivery so I said no problem. The MP gave me my phone and allowed me to text my wife and my friend about how to pay my bond.

So, I have my wife Zelle him the money for my bond but in the meantime I am being treated like a degenerate criminal. I was expecting to bond out within 30 minutes and then be released. Oh no, not here at the El Paso County Jail in Colorado Springs. I was taken into a property room and asked to remove all of my clothes including my underwear so they could perform a strip search. I said, "are you serious?" Yes, please remove all of your clothes. I was standing naked, in jail, and then I felt humiliated when I was asked to bend over and spread 'em wide and cough three times. I told the jail officer that I had just had back surgery and I was unable to bend over very far let alone reach behind my back and grab my cheeks to open wide. So, guess what? He did it for me. I had another man watch my a-hole while I bent over slightly and coughed three times to make sure nothing fell out of my cavity. Then I was given an orange El Paso County jumpsuit with orange Crocs. I then asked why all of this was necessary when my bond had already been paid and I was leaving which it had been paid while this was going on. I'm told that I am being treated like all of the other inmates and I must go to an intake holding cell. I'm sent to medical to see the nurses for a medical evaluation and medication. Back to my cell. Then, off to the desk to get blankets, a pillow, soap, toothbrush and back to my cell to await instructions for which cell I am going to in the "Tower" where all inmates are kept. After all of this occurs I am thinking that I am at the least spending the night in jail before they let me bond out. I sat in the intake cell, alone, for about an hour and then it was quickly filled to the brim with another 27 inmates. I keep quite and keep my head down. I'm listening to these guys talk about their charges. Guy on my direct right is a double murder charge. Guy on the left is caught with 50 kilos of meth in the trunk of his car. Guy across from me is active duty military at Fort Carson who suffered a gunshot wound to his hand and charged with aggravated assault because the bullet went through the leg of his roommate. Two guys start fighting and throwing punches and blood hits the floor. One guy is in withdrawal and starts puking and another drops a deuce in the floor as well. It stays that way for 5 hours before I am allowed out of the cell and in to the waiting area to make collect phone calls. I call my wife and let her know that I am okay and she confirms that she sent my friend the money almost instantly. I call my friend and he tells me that he paid my bond at 12:20pm.

At this point I am really thinking that I am in jail for the night because it's 6:00pm, my bond is already paid and I have been given everything but a cell number in the Tower. What is going on? Why am I still here. It's been just over 6 hours. Then I see a sign on the wall saying that the sheriff's department has 6 hours to release an inmate after the bond had been paid. I'm called up to the desk at 8:30pm and given my release paperwork and sent to property to get my belongings and to get dressed. My friggin bond wasn't processed until 3:00pm on the dot and I could not be released until 9:00pm.

My friend bobtailed to the jail and sat there waiting for me the whole time. He got to the jail at 12:15pm and sat in his Kenworth until I walked out at 9:15pm. He took me back to Fort Carson and much to my surprise my truck was still in the lane blocking the gate and the base or the police did not have it towed away. Thank goodness.

After all this I still had a load to deliver and the MP's told me that once the issue was taken care of that I would be allowed on the base and their word was good because Tuesday morning I was allowed to deliver my load without an escort and I was cleared for re-entry with a simple scan of my driver's license and I delivered my friend's load too.

Sorry this was such a novel but my point is that if you think you may have an active warrant or anything remotely sketchy in your background check make sure your affairs are in order before you present yourself for entry to a military base like Fort Carson or any other post so you don't have to go through anything like I did. You can call ahead to the base and confirm you will be allowed to enter based on what the MP's told me.

Please be safe and have a good ride!

 

Yes the weight should be the factor there….

 

The further I read, the more I was anticipating it turning into a joke. Just another reminder to say eff-off to any uncle sam loads. Not sure what options you have for suing for unlawful arrest, but I'd be either be lawyer hunting or doing something that would justify a warrant this go-around

 

What are you doing in Kentucky?

 

Take that officer's advisement to his superior to heart, and contact an attorney to sue, and let him do the work. That is outrageous and a good basis for a lawsuit as I've never heard of such a thing that you're required to appear for a warning with no ticket involved in the situation.