The education of an Idiot
An old boy who never considered himself to be the dullest knife in the drawer found out he might just be in need of a whetstone. Let me tell you the tale.
The guy was a speed-trap protester. He didn't like the way the town of Watts, Okla., bilks the motorists passing through town out of their hard earned shekels. He fixed up a large sign warning of the speed trap and sat out on the highway for days on end warning the public of the ARMED HIGHWAY ROBBERS hiding just down the road.
The Watts cops, a.k.a., Pigs with a pokey (the Stilwell jail), came up with a charge of disturbing the peace and had an Adair County Deputy do their dirty work and arrest him. He was in the Watts Town Office two days before and the cops must have had a brain poot cuz they didn't even spot him right there handy for arrestation.
He wuz hauled off to the pokey and had to pay $162 to the kind wrecker man who put his rig in the stable and possibly gave it a handful of oats. He had to also pay a bondsman $100 for an exit pass from the jail. Other bondsmen declined to post his bond because he was such a notorious criminal. (Or maybe they declined cuz they were buds with the speed trap judge.) Anyway, they evidently knew he wuz coming to town just like Santy Claws and thought they could force him to spend the night in gaol.
When the old boy showed up in court and and the prosecutor offered him a measly $10 fine and court costs for signing a paper pleading Nolo Contendere he agreed to do just that.
That is where he proved himself to be an idiot! The court costs were $353. He had to pay all kinds of far-out fees ranging from child abuse fees to health care trauma fees. He even had to pay for Forensic Science Improvement. It's unclear to me just how much improvement they could do with $4.87.
If you drive through Watts and he is sitting out beside his silly speed trap sign stop and tell him just how much of an idiot he is.
James Turner Little
Watts, Okla.
Editorial on 01/27/2016