Do you want to see how a county that boasts of the largest 4th of July celebration and proud owner of the "FREEDOM DAYS" festival treats their citizens? In the land where we have the highest proportion of "good and God fearing Mormon's" we tend to beat old women up for not watering their lawn.
Blade runner and the long arm of the lawSydney Morning Hearld
Dylan Welch
July 9, 2007 - 10:49
Utah, known for banning gambling and placing strict restrictions
on the sale and consumption of alcohol, can now add another notch
to its proscriptive belt - the unwatered front lawns of
senior citizens.
Betty Perry, 70, from Orem, in the state's north, experienced
the long arm of the law when a police officer attempted to charge
her for not watering her lawn, which was dry, brown and studded
with weeds.
According to local newspaper the Daily Herald, the
situation escalated when Mrs Perry refused to give her name to the
officer, and demanded her son be called.
The officer then decided the woman presented a clear and present
danger to the small Midwestern town, and tried to arrest her.
Mrs Perry says the officer accidentally hit her with handcuffs,
cutting her nose, although a police spokesman insisted she slipped
and fell.
"He had one [handcuff] loose on my arm and he was trying to get
my arms back and of course, you know, I'm resisting. 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.
Mrs Perry denied she was resisting arrest.
"I tried to sit down and get away from him. I wouldn't be doing
anything like that. He's just trying to cover his tracks, as far as
I'm concerned.
"He really abused me ... to get me to go to jail and put
handcuffs on me. For what? Because I didn't give him my name?
Because I wanted to call my son and see what I should do because
I've never had anything like this happen to me in my life?"
Orem police spokesman Lieutenant Doug Edwards said Mrs Perry was
released from jail after supervisors became aware of the situation,
and admitted it could have been resolved by other means.
"There were other ways of finding out who she was and dealing
with her violation short of taking her to jail," he said.
Mrs Perry told the newspaper she has owned the house for 11
years. The first time she ever had a problem with her lawn, she
said, was last summer when city officials came by and asked her to
remove the large weeds from her yard.
The weeds have always been a problem, and she plans to sell the
house because it is difficult to maintain the yard, she said.
The arresting officer has since been placed on administrative
leave, and Mrs Perry has not decided whether she will pursue legal
action, although she admits she has learnt a lesson from the
incident.
"Be kinder. Be gentler. If the policeman tells you to stand on
your head, do it," she told the newspaper.
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