Getting back to the mountains

Forty years ago I graduated from Hunter-Tannersville Central (HTC) School, a small public school in the Catskill Mountains in New York. One of the 50 graduates that year, our class represented one of the biggest classes ever at the school. Not many people choose to live in the area and the low number of children in the school system is the result.

When I think back to those times I remember specifically the little cliques that developed, based mostly on the area in which you lived. For instance, there was the Haines Falls crew at the very top of Route 23A where it climbs up out of the Hudson Valley and forms one entry into the area most people there call the Mountain Top. Haines Falls is about three miles from HTC. The area where I lived, Platte Clove, was closer to five miles away in a completely different direction and at the top of the Back Mountain road, which led up 1,500 feet from Woodstock, NY. Most of the children there formed their own clique. West Kill was another area at another access point, but it was much farther away—several of the students probably could have retired from the school system based solely on the amount of time they spent being ferried back and forth between the schools and their homes on a school bus. There were many other areas as well.

Our school alumni association sponsors a dinner every year. Everyone is invited, but a special effort is made for what they call the “celebrating classes” who fall on five or ten year anniversaries. Having graduated in 1973, this year marked my class’ 40^th anniversary. We were able to get 14 members to attend the dinner, and we had one dinner crasher who rounded out our group at 15 classmates.

One friend in particular, Fran Warm, whose parents owned the local restaurant in the “old”-haha- days, rented a condo for the weekend and held open house on Friday and Saturday for everyone to get together in a social environment. The condo was full, but we would have liked to have had even more of our classmates there.

It’s funny how things change over the years. The cliques, I suppose nowadays they would be called gangs, sort of disappeared as our collective vision of the world expanded. With our advanced years, we could now look back on the stories from our high school days and get a good laugh. Some stories came out that I didn’t remember, and of course there were those that I remembered but no one else did. I am still wondering if those things I recalled really happened—probably not, since I seem to make things up as I go along.

But the rest of the time was full of fun and merriment, as we tripped through our time at HTC. In such a small school, everybody was pretty much involved in everything. It was not unusual to be an athlete, a prize student, and the head of whatever local social club was going on. Everyone seemed to be active in different aspects of life.

Looking back at some of my friends from those days and strangely enough how things turned out sort of make sense. There are now two factions of our graduates. There is the group that stayed on the Mountain Top and managed to eke out a living. The area is depressed with a lack of what I would call good paying jobs, and in reality those that are good paying are limited in number.

The best jobs seem to be working for the State or County. Solid jobs with decent pay that allow you to do a bit more than subsist in the community when the weather starts acting up, like in August. For those who don’t happen to fall into a government job, employment is a little bleaker. It’s possible to find a niche in which you can develop your own business, and make a pretty good living. But for many, it’s working numerous part time gigs and trying to cobble together enough money to pay rent and cover other necessary living expenses.

My brother actually showed me the way out of the mountains by leaving home when he was 18 and heading to Florida. I followed two years later, and now most of my family has migrated away from NY. I guess I wasn’t only one who shuddered at the minus 32 degree temperatures and month-long cold snaps where the thermometer never got above zero.

Returning to the Mountain Top is always a great time for me. As we cruise up the slope on 23a that leads to Haines Falls, we pass rock outcrops and areas where we used to go swimming, and slide past Bastion Falls at the bottom of Kaaterskill Falls, one of the tallest in the state. A distance from there and we reach Haines Falls.

At times, I would like to spend a little more time on the Mountain Top than three days. It would be fun to visit the high school and see what’s changed. But in the end, I know the temperature will drop by September, snow will appear in October or November and stay until April or May. I think for now, I would prefer to stay in Virginia, where the temperatures don’t get too much below freezing and rarely if ever reach sub-zero.

Pull over, I want to search your vehicle

Heavy handed police tactics are in vogue today mainly due to the cleanup that has taken place in New York City under Mayor Michael Bloomberg. In essence, the policy under Bloomberg is that when you make a police stop, you question the person you are stopping. Some people credit the policy with making the streets safer in NYC. Others say that there is nothing to prove that those policies are responsible for the downturn in violent crime. No one will ever really know the answer to the question without significant research.

But similar policies are being followed now throughout the US, even here in Virginia and neighboring North Carolina. Recently I have heard about three incidents involving similar tactics that some police departments are using against young male adults. I know that’s hard to believe, but, you know, stuff happens.

These first two accounts happened in Virginia. A young under 20’s man was driving home after mowing his grandmother’s lawn. A local police officer spotted his car and noted that one of his tail lights was not working—grounds for a quick stop.

While I was not privy to the stop, this is somewhat the way the incident went down as relayed to me. I know I know, we all want “Nothing but the facts,” but sometimes the facts are hard to nail down.

Upon stopping the young man, the officer took a moment to look into the backseat. There on the floorboard were some leaves of grass left over from cutting the lawn. At that point, the tenor of the conversation changed from “get your light fixed” to “what’s that in your back seat, I think it’s marijuana.”

That opened up a series of questions that ran along the lines of, “Okay, we know who you are, so who’s got all the drugs in town?” The attitude and tenor of the inquisition continued with the officer trying to frighten the young man into divulging something—anything—that might incriminate him and earn the officer a PD-kudu for netting a drug arrest from a traffic stop.

Second incident. Coming home one night after the Super Bowl a young man was having medical problems, stopped on the side of the road, and got out of his car. A local police officer stopped and tried to talk to him. He was basically unresponsive, due to some kind of seizure. The officer attempted to handcuff the young man. Backup arrived and they had a hard time dealing with the man. They fought him to the ground and beat him up a bit in doing so.

At that time, the local fire department arrived and an EMT took a look at the culprit. He immediately recognized the seizure. No charges were ever filed in the case and the family was told that it would be useless to try to sue the department. The issue was dropped.

The most recent incident that I have heard about happened in North Carolina. The young man was following his friend to the Outer Banks when a local police officer pulled him for “following too close.” They made him get out of his car, which he did. They then asked him, “You seem nervous, I think you are on drugs.”

The officer told the youth that following too close carried a $180 fine. After a short discussion, he asked the driver for permission to search his car and that if not he would just get a warrant. Still nervous, the young man allowed the search. During the search, a backup officer arrived and he took the moment to go through the driver’s backpack. After the search, the officer came out of the car holding up some scrap and stating that it was pot. But, he said, since they did not find any paraphernalia, they would believe that it wasn’t his and did not charge him. Again in this incident, no charges were filed—nothing for the alleged drugs and no ticket for following too close.

It certainly makes one wonder about the tactics being employed today involving young men. Using grass clippings as “probable cause” for marijuana questioning seems a bit out of line. Not taking the time to find out what is going on with someone standing on the roadside and going into Rambo mode seems a bit over the top. Using a trumped up reason to stop someone for a charge that usually isn’t employed except in rear end crashes seems a bit speculative on the part of the officer.

And, ultimately, stopping naïve young men seems a bit like profiling. In none of those cases were there any charges filed. In none of those cases were the young men doing anything that they shouldn’t have been doing.

We really need to teach our children what to do when they are stopped for basically no reason at all and treated in any manner that might be construed as bullying. We have rules to stop bullying in high schools, but most people don’t expect to be bullied by the police. I am certain that these three incidents are the only times such things have happened.

Courts do the right thing for VSU student

Typically once the wheels of justice start rolling they simply grind away and leave the remnants behind like corn shards at the base of the millwheel. But every once in a while, and surprisingly at that, the wheels of justice find that reverse gear and back up just long enough right an unconscionable wrong.

Such was the case recently involving a hazing incident at Virginia State University (VSU). It seems that one of the students rushing the Alpha Phi Alpha fraternity complained about some of his treatment in working through his way through the pledging circus. For whatever reason, the student let the schools find out about his problem, and the police cast their net to haul in a nice fresh crop of likely suspects.

Three students and a civilian were hauled in front of the Petersburg courts, where Commonwealth’s Attorney Cassandra Conover offered a sweat-hearts deal: plead guilty to hazing and they would be able to graduate and if they paid the court costs and “complied with all agreements between the commonwealth attorney’s office and VSU officials” their charges would be dismissed in a month. Initially, all four culprits agreed pled no contest to the charges, as recommended by the prosecution.

But before the ink was dry on the charges, Brandon Randleman, who just happened to be the former student association president, had misgivings. He hired an attorney to try to get his plea overturned. Armed with a signed affidavit from the person who was the subject of the hazing, Randleman sought to get his plea thrown out. The affidavit stated that in no way was Randleman involved in the hazing and at no time did Randleman every hurt the complainant.

Usually, once you plead guilty you stay guilty whether or not something happens afterward. But in this case, the court actually took Randleman’s request under consideration.

He stated that Conover effectively “coerced Randleman into pleading guilty without first consulting an attorney.” Conover denies bringing any pressure and stated that Randleman waived his right to an attorney before a judge. But stop for a minute and put yourself in this young man’s shoes. He didn’t do anything wrong and here he is caught up in a bit of a nightmare. There were concerns about his being able to graduate on time and anytime you are facing a prosecutor there ought to be a general sense of fear and confusion. While Conover might not have thought she was bringing pressure, the very act of being the commonwealth’s attorney in such an incident supports Randleman’s allegation.

Randleman contacted defense attorney Joseph D. Morrissey, who himself has had some experience with the courts and how the court and the justice league really work, to see if he could get the charges dropped. Long story short, Petersburg brought in a special prosecutor, Shawn Gobble, who withdrew the hazing charge.

In the end, it was the right thing to do. It is an experience I am sure Randleman will never forget. Ultimately, it’s good to see that the wheels of justice can stop for a minute and make an appropriate correction. Good luck in your future Brandon; I hope this experience doesn’t taint your respect for the law.