Vandalism

Early evening, we were sitting in the boat. Across the canal, a kid walked down the dock. He strarted to get on one of the rental paddleboats, then put his knee on the bimini (the canvas top) and put all of his weight on it. Of course, it broke. He ran back up the dock, laughing.

It was too late to stop him from doing the damage, but I grabbed the camera and got a photo of the little s**t. Several boaters on the dock saw it; I went up to the Welcome Center to report it, and saw another boater on the phone... yep, calling 911. He said they were busy with other stuff and couldn’t get right out.

I called 911 and told the dispatcher, “I have a photo of this kid as he ran off. This could be bad publicity for your tourism industry.”

“We’ll get someone right out.”

There were two other kids watching the obnoxious s**t, and they sat on a bench after he ran off. When they saw the police car pull up on the other side, they started walking away. I told the police officer, “Those kids know the kid who did this... he hid behind them before he ran off.”
The police officer stopped the teenagers, and they, of course, denied seeing anything. I said, “Honey, I have a photo of the kid hiding behind you. I have a photo of the kid running off, with a nice clear shot of his face. Now, why don’t you tell this nice police officer who the kid is.”

They did.

I went back to the boat and printed a photo of the kid to give to the police. The officer chucked and said, “Well, that’s Jessie. Nice photo. We don’t often get a photo as evidence. We know this kid.”

It took a while to do the paperwork and the officer thanked me for my time and for having the presence of mind to get a photo. He also wanted us to know that they just don’t have problems here on the waterfront.

Hopefully, the kid will have to make restitution to the boat rental guy.

Running from the vandalism...

I'm not showing the kid's face because he's a minor. He's also an idiot.