Zero Tolerance: Metro Snack Patrol Puts Girl in Cuffs

[Yoshie Furuhashi <furuhashi.1@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

Time to watch Jean Vigo's _Zéro de conduite [Zero for Conduct]_
(1933) again....   Yoshie

*****   Metro Snack Patrol Puts Girl in Cuffs

Ansche Hedgepeth had practically never been in trouble, let alone
arrested.  Then the officer clicked the metal cuffs on the
12-year-old's wrists and pulled the laces out of her tennis shoes.

She had been eating French fries in a Metro station, and now she was
questioned, searched and taken away.

"We really do believe in zero tolerance," said Metro Transit Police
Chief Barry J. McDevitt, who is unapologetic for such arrests.

Commuter complaints about unlawful eating on Metro cars and in
stations led McDevitt to mount a week-long undercover crackdown on
violators last month, and a dozen plainclothes officers cited or
arrested 35 people, 13 of them juveniles.   Only one adult was
arrested.

Had Ansche and the other juveniles been adults, they simply would
have received citations for fines up to $300.   But, McDevitt pointed
out, juveniles charged with criminal offenses in the District must be
taken into custody.

And, he said, it is department policy to handcuff anyone who is
arrested, no matter the age.   "Anyone taken into custody has to be
handcuffed for officer safety," McDevitt said.  Youngsters "can kill
you, too."

Ansche well remembers Oct. 23, the first day of the crackdown.

The seventh-grader at Deal Junior High School said the Tenleytown-AU
station, where she was nabbed, is "just a place where a lot of kids
go.  There's a hot dog stand and Cafe Med, where I bought my fries.

"She said she took the elevator to the station with a friend.   As
the pair passed the station kiosk, a man stepped in front of Ansche.

"He said: 'Put down your fries. Put down your book bag,'" Ansche
said.  "They searched my book bag and searched me.  They asked me if
I have any drugs or alcohol."

Ansche, who keeps her science fair trophy next to her bed, said she
has never been asked those questions or searched like that before.

"I was embarrassed.  I told my friend to call my mom, but I didn't
tell anybody else," she said.  She said she never talked to the
officer, although Metro police insist that she was asked whether she
knew eating was against the law and that she said she did.  They said
anyone who doesn't know about the law usually is given a warning
first.

The youths were all taken to the detention center, where they were
checked in, fingerprinted and held for their parents to pick them up,
McDevitt said.

Ansche now must perform community service and undergo counseling at
the Boys and Girls Club, one of the sentences Metro has chosen for
underage snacking scofflaws.  "I can't believe there isn't a better
way to teach kids a lesson," said Ansche's mother, Tracey Hedgepeth.
"The police treated her like a criminal."

She wrote a letter complaining about the incident, and McDevitt
replied: "While I am sorry that it was necessary to take your
daughter into custody, I hope you also understand the important
responsibility we have to keep public transportation safe and
clean."...

[To view the entire article, go to
<http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A28074-2000Nov15.html>]
*****