Practical Penumbra

What is wrong with people?

It seems like I have to ask that question more times every day. Today it's in response to a post of Jim's that I found at Jennifer's. Last night it was in regard to an incident at work where I had to call the police because of an altercation between two patrons in the lobby.
No, altercation is too harsh a word. Here's how it went:

One of the local institutions for the mentally handicapped brought a small group of their disabled residents to see a movie. This is actually a fairly common occurance; there are a number of group homes, halfway houses, homes for "troubled youth" etc. that make the dollar movies their destination of choice for "outings". Ordinarily there's no trouble. Last night, however, one of the group snatched a pager off the blouse of a woman who was there with her children to see a movie (for some reason she had her pager clipped to the front of her blouse). One of the attendants took the offender out to their van since this misbehavior cost him his movie-going privileges. But is this the end of it? No. The woman wanted her money back since she was now too traumatized to watch a movie.

Here's the thing. Once you've purchased your tickets, they're YOUR tickets, especially once they've been ripped in half when you enter the lobby. If you suddenly decide, for whatever reason, not to see that movie, you're SOL. However, because sometimes problems do arise (for example, Grandma being conned into taking the kiddies to a PG-13 movie, which she realizes after a few minutes is not appropriate for 10 years olds) I have movie passes which I can distribute at my discretion. So when the woman demanded a refund, I gave the cashier five movie passes to give her. (Aside: why does everthing happen at show time? I have a movie to thread and start, and that's when people call to speak to me, or inform me their little darling has just puked all over the restroom, or an irate customer wants their money back because although the cashier TOLD them before they bought their tickets that the theater was very full and they probably wouldn't find seats together, they couldn't find seats together...).

Movie passes were not acceptable. The woman wanted her five dollars back. I explained to her that torn tickets are not refundable for cash. We cannot re-use them. She told me she was so upset by what had occurred that she would never be returning, therefore the passes were useless to her. Now, I don't know her--it's possible that she has a long-buried childhood trauma that makes her terrified of the mentally disabled, and the extremely remote chance that she might encounter another one of these groups on an outing has her paralyzed in fear. However, she discarded her ace of trump with that remark, because, since her future business is not now an issue, I have no business motivation to appease her (if I could, short of actual cash back). So I apologized, took the passes she returned to me, and went back to work.

Enter the boyfriend. He wants her money back, too. He explains how her poor children had to see their mother "attacked" in our lobby. He asks how I would feel if the same thing had happened to me when I was with my children. I do not say "Well, it seems to me that making this big of an issue of it is going to scar the children far worse than shrugging it off and explaining that the poor man didn't know any better," which is what I was thinking. So he says that if I don't give them her money back he is going to call the police and press charges. Fine, I'll call the police for you.

Which I did. The desk sergeant made me repeat what had happened three times; I think he was as incredulous as I that someone wanted to press charges against a mentally handicapped person for grabbing a pager off of someone's blouse. Meanwhile, the counselor who was not sitting in the van with the "perp" called her supervisor, who sent over the institution's security guards and a head honcho.

When the first patrol car arrived, the woman ran over to the officer to tell him what happen before he could even get out of his car. I don't know what she said, but I heard his reply: "Ma'am, I can't make them give you your money back."

The woman, two officers and the head honcho eventually had a huddle in the lobby. My cashier told me later that the head honcho gave the woman five dollars. I assume from this that charges were not pressed against the mentally handicapped man, who was taken away in another van by the institution's security guards.

I feel very badly about involving the police in something so petty (especially since one of the officers had been listening to the Cubs game when he got the call), but what other choice did I have once the boyfriend said he wanted to press charges?

The kids--I mean, my employees--later said it was the best entertainment they'd had all week. I was wishing for a six pack of Michelob tucked into the ice making machine when it was over ...

(Note to jim long: although this is based on a true story, names and certain details have been withheld to protect the parties involved; it is unlikely there will be a newspaper account of it, and probably no police report either. If this makes you doubt my veracity, keep your opinions to yourself. Thank you).

UPDATE: I removed the quotes from jim long's name since I have apparently misjudged him by my implication that that is not his real name. I apologize for any inconvenience.

Posted by Susie at October 15, 2003 12:12 PM | TrackBack