› Forums › Geocaching in Wisconsin › General › Zuma and KSpud Questioned by Johnny Law
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Ashen15.
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03/27/2011 at 1:34 pm #1731728
Had my first real encounter with law enforcement yesterday, at GC2MDKD.
I have run into police quite a few times while caching, but always briefly and always with good natured cops. But yesterday was a whole different thing. KSpud and I were in fact climbing on a bike path trestle, which was unfortunately visible from the highway which caught his attention when he drove by. And I can certainly understand how that might prompt the curiousity of law enforcement.
He drove down the bike trail in his squad car, demanding to see our IDs and ran them thru his computer. Then he had to verify we were actually geocaching (which he knew about already) and looked up the cache page to see if there was really a cache where we said there was, because “I might get complaints of terrorists on the bridge.”
Terrorists? In Elgin Minnesota? Even he knew that was a stretch, but he said he had to make sure anyway.
Anyway, took 20 minutes to run all the data, and for him to decide we were just smucks looking for a cache and not terrorists looking to blow up a bike trail bridge in the middle of nowhere, Minnesota.
The guy was professional, but pretty unfriendly about it, and we just gave him the requested information, as I do see how it looked funny to see people climbing on the bridge. But terrorists?
zuma
03/27/2011 at 2:58 pm #1945638Disgruntled Vikings fan?
Musta been a slow week in Minnesota.
03/27/2011 at 3:27 pm #1945639The police may be a bit “touchy”, after one of their finest was killed recently. Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan… The officers are a close family, doing a job I wouldn’t want.
Glad it worked out, zuma and Kspud.
Keep on cachin’ in the still free world! 😀
03/27/2011 at 4:13 pm #1945640Well count your lucky stars it wasn’t a puzzle final you were looking for. That could have added a whole different dimension to his verification of this one.
Glad to hear it worked out OK. I certainly see both sides of this and I’ve also had the “20+ minute” experience. They’re just doing their jobs and we should be thankful they’re doing this. Keep in mind the officer noticed something was “out of place”, so he was probably on the alert and his instincts were telling him this wasn’t the situation he expected which heightens his senses even more. He was also off the beaten path and outnumbered which I’m sure adds to it.
03/27/2011 at 4:45 pm #1945641@CodeJunkie wrote:
Well count your lucky stars it wasn’t a puzzle final you were looking for. That could have added a whole different dimension to his verification of this one.
Glad to hear it worked out OK. I certainly see both sides of this and I’ve also had the “20+ minute” experience. They’re just doing their jobs and we should be thankful they’re doing this. Keep in mind the officer noticed something was “out of place”, so he was probably on the alert and his instincts were telling him this wasn’t the situation he expected which heightens his senses even more. He was also off the beaten path and outnumbered which I’m sure adds to it.
Outnumbered for sure, but he had the guns and the radio. He really didnt need the mean cop attitude.
The biggest thing on this cache is that it is a 4.5/4.5 on a trestle, in plain sight of a highway, so it is impossible to look for it and not look out of place.
I personally think a hide of this type would be fine, on a trestle in the woods where folks are not driving by. But right next to the road only invites questions of why folks are climbing on it. Even as we approached it, Karl commented how we would be right out in the open to passersby, so we were aware of the potential.
The best way to avoid contacts with law enforcement is to avoid doing weird stuff in public places, a rule of thumb that we didnt stick with here. I generally do stick to that rule of thumb though, and if I cant find a cache in an urban area where eyes might be watching me in a few minutes, I try to move along before suspucious minds play their tricks.
z
03/27/2011 at 6:35 pm #1945642thinkin’ that you and Karl climbing on a trestle in the middle of the woods would still look out of place 🙂
Disclaimer : Always answering to a higher power.
03/27/2011 at 6:56 pm #1945643Ralph, Give up Cuban cigars and you’ll be just fine! LOL In fact, if you give up the whole sport like Trekkin’ has just decided, all problems have evaporated.
We tried to find that same cache about two months ago. It was so nasty cold that even law enforcement was staying inside.
03/27/2011 at 7:27 pm #1945644What we will all do to sign a slip of paper in a hidden container…
Wonderful reason to educate the law enforcement public (as I see being one of the boards goals). Even then its not a guarantee. I’ve been stopped by these public servants multiple times and each time I walk away having been made to feel like “I” have done something wrong. Watch out when you’re around Weston, Wisconsin.
03/27/2011 at 7:54 pm #1945645@Northwoods Tom wrote:
What we will all do to sign a slip of paper in a hidden container…
Wonderful reason to educate the law enforcement public (as I see being one of the boards goals). Even then its not a guarantee. I’ve been stopped by these public servants multiple times and each time I walk away having been made to feel like “I” have done something wrong. Watch out when you’re around Weston, Wisconsin.
Really? I’ve done most of the caches in and around Weston and I’ve never had any problems.
I’ve had two run-ins with the law. I was reported to the police for trespassing when all I did was drive down a dead-end road near Mosinee.The other one was at the 2010 West Bend Cache Bash, if you can believe that. I believe it was a Washington County sherriff deputy, that had a problem with a cache being hidden inside a gas-line warning pylon. I suggested to him that if there really was a gas line, there would be more than one pylon. 😆 He still didn’t like it.
All opinions, comments, and useless drivel I post are mine alone and do not reflect the opinions of the WGA BOD.
03/27/2011 at 9:13 pm #1945646Was looking for a dead-end road cache.
After I found and logged it, I got pulled over on the main street by the police. I showed him my GPS unit, the cache page, and explained the activity. He proceeded back to the car, I assume to run my plates and what ever else, 20+ minutes latter, he says I can go.
Just a couple miles down the road, had another (or the same?) squad, check me out at another site from down the street. At least this time he/she didn’t stop me. Ended up looking over my shoulder at every stop after that on this day.
I asume that he was checking on me because I was pulling a trailer at the time with equipment on it and wanted to make sure I wasn’t doing illegal dumping of trash? Sometimes when I have been stopped, after I’ve explained the activity, the reaction has been much more friendly. I must look guilty… 😯
03/27/2011 at 9:21 pm #1945647Glad to hear it worked out in the end. I’ve been stopped several times and each time the officer knew all about geocaching and was very friendly. One even offered to help me, as he knew where it was. But I agree – on a trestle is not a good place for a cache, and I’m not sure I would even bother trying it. But then, I’m getting picky in my old age. Couple years ago I would have gone for it 🙂
03/27/2011 at 11:09 pm #1945648There is something seriously wrong with our society when we spend 20 minutes harassing two guys on a bike trail bridge in the middle of nowhere but can’t pull people out of an airport queue because we don’t want to be accused of profiling.
On the Left Side of the Road...03/27/2011 at 11:13 pm #1945649@jim1830 wrote:
Glad to hear it worked out in the end. I’ve been stopped several times and each time the officer knew all about geocaching and was very friendly. One even offered to help me, as he knew where it was. But I agree – on a trestle is not a good place for a cache, and I’m not sure I would even bother trying it. But then, I’m getting picky in my old age. Couple years ago I would have gone for it 🙂
LOL. My better judgement argued strongly in favor of letting it go, since the trestle was so close to a highly traveled road, and there was no way to look for it without looking suspicious. The best way to avoid encounters with law enforcement is to avoid doing suspicious looking stuff.
However, the temptation of a FTF on a 4.5/4.5 cache was too great for me to pass up. Must be something wrong with me, but I will work on it. 🙂
zuma
03/29/2011 at 3:02 pm #1945650And y’all know about my experience with the Ashwaubenon LEO’s with that bomb scare last year. That experience still has soured me on urban caching.
I’ll still look for urban caches, but not as much as I used to. I would drive to the location and if it is too high traffic, I simply drive away. And if I do make an effort to look in a high traffic area, I give it a minute or two tops and I’m gone. Caches in a high traffic area should be set up for a quick grab, not for someone to spend 10 minutes looking for it. Just my opinion.
03/30/2011 at 8:57 pm #1945651Well geez Ralph, you didn’t have my handsome self to do the sweet-talking. Karl could be mistaken for menacing, and you just naturally look like you’re up to no good 😉 .
I have officially lost count of the times we have had discussions with the boys in blue (and brown, and green…), but luckily all of ours have been rather innocuous. I’ve found that the best approach has been to just stop what you’re doing and put on a smile. Most are now aware of geocaching, and are fairly reasonable.
That being said it looks like you proved the exception.
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