The Blotter: Snake charmer

Costumed folks will fill the streets of Atlanta this weekend as Dragon Con, Decatur Book Festival, and other events take place around the city. Expect outfits ranging from Princess Leia to zombies as well as SEC football fans squeezing into skimpy cheerleading outfits that haven’t fit for years. Weeks before the madness began, ATL got extra-wacky, showing that true Atlantans don’t need a high-concept costume to let their freak flags fly.

Floodwaters recently gushed from an apartment filled with slithery creatures on Peachtree Street. “I went to the 10th floor and observed several inches of water covering the south hallway,” a cop noted. “I walked into the unit where the water was coming from and observed water pouring from the ceiling in the smaller room to the left. I also observed several snake habitats with snakes in the room.”

The 35-year-old man in the snake-filled apartment “stated he was high on methamphetamines and because of his paranoia he ignited a lighter directly next to a sprinkler head, which caused the sprinkler system to start and not stop,” the cop noted. “[He] said he was feeling very paranoid and began to observe pieces of crack, cocaine and heroin inside his apartment. [He] stated that he found these drugs to be alarming because he exclusively uses methamphetamines and these other drugs are not up to his standards.”

The paranoia-inspired flood damaged apartments on the ninth and 10th floor. The paranoid man complained of chest pains, so cops took him to Piedmont Hospital.

Night of the Living Baseheads

Cops received a call about a disturbance outside the Five Points MARTA station. According to the police report a 41-year-old man “took all of his clothes off” and ran into traffic on Peachtree Street. Gawkers were “looking or taking video of the naked man. ... He had some wet pants that he abandoned in the roadway” and a pipe alledgedly tumbled from his soggy pants. The cop tried to talk with the nude dude. Silence. The man “refused to speak and appeared to be under the influence of possible [bath salts], due to no speech, irrational behavior, and appearing to be in another state of mind,” the cop wrote. The cop urged the man to put on his pants, but he received the silent treatment. The cop concluded his report with this observation: “His wet garments were in poor shape and wet.” At the jail, the cop was instructed to put the naked man in a cell and toss his wet pants into the trash.

Beer for breakfast

In Little Five Points, two cops saw a Kennesaw man walking in the road and “waving his hands in the air” at cars whizzing by. The cops stopped the man and asked him what he was doing. The 27-year-old said he was trying to get a ride to Briarcliff and North Druid Hills. He “was extremely intoxicated and staggering,” the cops noted. “We advised [him] he should not be in the roadway because it was dangerous and he could have been struck by a vehicle ” The Kennesaw man defiantly responded, “I wasn’t in the street. Define what a street is.” Uninterested in word games, the cops arrested him for drunk and disorderly charges. The Kennesaw man countered by requesting a favor. One cop noted, “While in custody, [the man] asked for my phone number and if he could take me out for dinner and drinks.”

Itchycoo Park

A 21-year-old man wearing a green-and-black hat with a hidden compartment was acting overly friendly at a recent comedy show. An audience member told a security guard that the guy was alledgedly selling LSD and ONYX. Cops searched the guy and found 18 tabs of suspected LSD and eight pills of suspected ONYX in a silver container, plus $118 cash. According to police, the alleged drug dealer “spontaneously” admitted that yes, he was trying to sell the tabs as LSD, but the tabs were actually fakes. Cops noted his “pupils were dilated” as they took him to jail.

Happy Hour

In Collier Heights, a 26-year-old man parked his car on a stranger’s lawn and knocked on the doors of nearby homes. Neighbors called police. The man claimed his car broke down and he needed ride. The man seemed disoriented and “out of it,” a cop noted. “He was not acting normal” and appeared “very relaxed.”

The man explained that he was exhausted and dehydrated from being out in the sun all day. Cops asked him to do a few sobriety tests. During the walk-and-turn, the man’s “arms were very flaccid ... and not by his sides because they were ‘dangling’ as he walked,” a cop noted. Plus, the man did a fancy spin at the end. Moments later, he burst out laughing. Finally, the cop noted, “I asked [him] to stick out his tongue and pull down his eyelids. I observed that [the man’s] tongue was very green in color.” The green-tongued man went to jail on DUI charges.

Wang-Dang-Doodle All Night Long

Two tourists in their 30s got wacky outside a Midtown wine bar. One hails from Nashville and the other from South Daytona, Fla. Both were “very uneasy on their feet and kept stumbling, almost falling over,” a cop noted. The tourists stood in the doorway, blocking other patrons from entering. Then they dashed from the doorway, stumbling and running into people. A cop asked them if they were OK. The Nashville guy replied, “Yes we are.” What about his friend? “He’s fucking fine!” the Nashville guy said. The cop told both men to get in a cab and go home for the night. They agreed and began to walk away. Moments later, the two tourists crept back toward the wine bar. The Florida man stumbled and fell into a window, almost breaking it. The cop asked why they were trying to sneak into the wine bar. “Fuck you! That’s why,” the Nashville man said, bursting into laughter.

The Florida man “attempted to speak” but was incomprehensible, the cop noted, plus he “had scraps [sic] on his left knee due to falling and he had also hit his head on the sidewalk.” Also, “his heart rate was very high and he was showing signs of being under influence of possible drugs.” The cop rode in an ambulance with the handcuffed Florida man. “[He] kept trying to remove his handcuff that was attached to the stretcher with his free hand,” the cop wrote. “I told [him] to stop but he refused and kept [pulling] on it, almost breaking the stretcher. I once again told [him] to stop tampering with his handcuff and that’s when he spit on my legs.” Medics put a “spit hood” over the Florida man’s head, who “kept [swinging] at me with his free hand,” the cop noted. The Florida man promptly passed out at the hospital.

Items in the Blotter are taken from actual Atlanta police reports. The Blotter Diva compiles them and puts them into her own words.