Our Local Drama, A Comedy of Errors

So it all started last Friday, the police chase and two people escaping across pastures. Well they caught them, the official story here and here. That is what the cops are saying, read it and remember because from here out it is all gossip and hear say and much more interesting if I do say so myself.

The last we heard was to lock doors and beware, dangerous criminals were roaming the neighborhood, then, nothing. A whole weekend of wondering what was going on. Gossip started to trickle in. The private plane that found them was piloted by a friend of a friend. He was bored and decided to go looking. He found them easily and circled waiting for police to come. They may have been carrying things into an abandoned house. They saw him and took off again. Still no police, they were a hill or two over and couldn’t find their way.

He watched as the poor Subaru died and they ran on afoot. Running low on fuel he headed back long enough to refill then went back and found them again. Getting bored with the game he buzzed them sending them diving. Still no police arrived and he got tiered of it and went home.

That was the last we heard until the news broke Sunday that they, or someone, got arrested in Hay Springs at the gas station. They leave out any interesting details though. I was dieing of curiosity wanting to know where they had been and what they had been doing.

Monday morning we got the first part of the story. A certain ranch family had brought them in at gun point and handed them over to the cops. Two people had the same basic story so it had some credibility. Then talking to a friend I mentioned the excitement and she sat back in her chair arms crossed and began the story. The news had it all wrong, her father had been there. At last the whole story.

The couple had gotten gas in Alliance and left with out paying. They were trying to get to Edgemont to see the girls mother who was, supposedly, dieing of cancer but they didn’t have any money. Then they sped out of town bringing on the police. They had no clue where they were going and headed the wrong direction across a pasture. Edgemont is northwest, they went east. After the car died they huddled in a tree row, supposedly not too far from where the car stopped.

It hasn’t been miserably cold the last few days, it didn’t even freeze one night. Saturday was down right nice even, but they are from Greeley, not here. They were not dressed for what they were doing. She was wearing spandex and “moccasin flip flop things”. Neither had warm clothes or supplies, they did have a dog. They didn’t eat it or anything interesting, it’s just amusing that they were running from the police carrying a small dog. They had stranded themselves on the border between farm country and ranch land, in the farmed areas it is fairly populated, a house at least every mile or two. If they had strayed to much further into the sandhills houses and people become much fewer and farther between. They could have become permanently lost.

Apparently western Nebraska was more than they could take, they ran into the road flagging down the vehicle of said ranch family. The man and his wife stopped and picked them up. That is pretty amazing to me, knowing that these were the people running from the police, it would have been hard not to recognize them or at least realize that they weren’t any of your neighbors,  they stopped and picked them up. With their children in the car.

These are RANCHERS, the epitome of the name, the ones who’s yard I would not want to hide in as a fugitive. The wife should not be considered a bystander, she is one tough woman. So, never fear, they had a plan, they called a neighbor, my friends father, and asked him to bring them a gun. I am kind of surprised that they didn’t have one with them. He brought them a gun and took the children with him. Two of these children are large teenage boys, I should mention that, I would be scared of them not the other way around.

They called the police. Our county told them that they wanted nothing to do with this, it was the problem of the other county that had started the chase. The man,or probably the wife, told them to get the other county called then because the people really wanted to be saved from the wilds of Nebraska. The couple were frozen solid, the man complaining that his joints were aching from being out in the elements for the last few days. They fell asleep nearly instantly, after recounting some of the horrors of their journey, and slept all the way to town where the police had agreed to meet them.

On arrival they refused to get out of the vehicle. It was the first warmth they had had for so long. The rancher talked them in to coming inside by promising a nice hot cup of coffee. Supposedly, upon getting out of the vehicle, the police pushed Rancher out of the way, ordered the man to his knees and when his sore aching joints didn’t allow him to move fast enough they tased him. Both were taken to the hospital to be treated for the results of their adventure.

I don’t know if all of that is true, as always with gossip I guess. In defense of our local cops most of them are really good guys. Except, of course, for the one that was at the car wreck before Christmas. When asked if the two poor, cold, dazed, boys from the wreck could sit in his car to stay warm, because we really did have a train to catch, he was horrified and only reluctantly agreed. To busy standing there with his lights flashing trying to look important I guess. So we will say he was the taser if there was one.

It started out scarey, looked like it was going to be a really funny story and wound up just being pitiful. A comedy of errors.