The Ave 47 Gang

Last week over breakfast, I was telling Friedman that my wife and I were ready to pull the plug.  We are both retired now that I've been canned, the family trust has been updated, and our cremation services are pre-paid.  We're out of here!  A day or so later, it dawned on me that if Derek Jeter can do it, there's no reason why I shouldn't be able to arrange my very own farewell tour.

I set about making a list of the stops that would make up the tour.  The first would have to be the Highland Park Police Station on York Boulevard.  This was where I spent a night in the hoosegow in 1966.  The building remains as the oldest surviving police station, now serving as the Los Angeles Police Museum, sitting directly across the street from a Coco's.  It opened in 1926, survived a bomb planted by the Symbionese Liberation Army in 1973; and directed the case of the Hillside Strangler in the 1980s.  The night I spent in a cell there, Captain Daryl Gates commanded the station.  Daryl Gates, who in 1942 spent a night in the same jail after punching a police officer.   Daryl Gates, who rose through the ranks to be the Los Angeles Chief of Police from 1978 to 1992. 

Wilson, Moore, Hickson and Mikelson, were nabbed along with me.  We were in Kershner's and Moore's apartment on North Avenue 47, a half block south of York Boulevard, and a short ten-block ride east to the station.  The apartment is still there, I drove by it yesterday.  Kershner had gone home to Santa Barbara and the five of us were experimenting with a speaker phone that he had ripped off while on a summer job with the telephone company.  In addition to the speaker phone, Kershner had installed six other phones in the apartment so that according to him, he wouldn't have to go far to answer the phone.  He also had another phone that was a James Bond sort of device.  He claimed that it was illegal for a non-telephone company employee to have such a phone, and that if discovered in his possession, he would be subject to a $50,000 fine. 

The 007 phone could be clipped onto any telephone line, came with a manual dial, and could be used to call anywhere for free.  Kershner and Wilson would sneak up to the back of an apartment in the middle of the night, clip on to someone's line, and Wilson would talk to his girl friend Martha who attended Oberlin College in Ohio.  While Wilson and Martha were seniors in high school, they were members of the debate team that took either first or second (I can't remember) at the national championships.   

We were all in the back bedroom where Mikelson was trying to work the phone, dialing numbers at random, when a woman's voice came over the speaker, "Hello."

Mikelson asked, "I may have misdialed, is this 257-7279?"

The woman answered, "Not quite, this is 257-7929."

Mikelson said, "Get off the phone lady, I have an important call to make."

The woman, unfazed, "Young man, don't you have something better to do?"

Mikelson frustrated, "Ah, go suck a goat's bladder."

Outside the window of the bedroom were police officers listening to the conversation.  They had responded to a disturbing the peace complaint as we evidently had been making a lot of noise.  The next thing I knew there were police all over the inside of the apartment.  They had all of us sitting on the living room with our hands cuffed behind us as they looked through the apartment.  The five phones in the living room looked suspicious especially with the large table in the center of the room covered with cards, poker chips and slips of paper noting who owes who how much.

One of the policemen, "Okay red, what's your name?"

Moore, a redhead, answered, "I'm Mike."

The policemen continued, "Well Mike, you want to tell me what we've got here?"

Moore said, "Just a friendly game once in a while, do you like poker?"  An interesting comment in retrospect, as Moore eventually went on to manage a casino in Reno, Nevada.

The policeman, smiling, "The phones, Mike, tell me about the phones."

Moore said, "I know it looks unusual, but it's a real time saver."

The police huddled, conferred with each other, placed us in police cars and drove us to the Highland Park Police Station.  They had either not seen the 007 phone, or if they had, they had no idea what it was.  We were interviewed separately, put in cells, and released in the morning when Hickson's dad, a lawyer, paid our bail.

Mr. Hickson explained that they initially thought they had stumbled onto a bookie operation.  When we were interrogated, all of us refused to talk until they interviewed Hickson.  For some unknown reason, he had told officers that we had made a steady habit of harassing people on the phone.  The cops knew we weren't bookies but once they heard Hickson's story, they called the woman at 257-7929, and got her to file a complaint.

The five of us were charged with making obscene phone calls.  Hickson's dad knew a criminal attorney and the two of them would represent us at no cost.  It turned out that Hickson's confession was thrown out because he was never mirandized.  It must have been one of the first times a criminal defense made use of the law.  The Miranda v Arizona decision came down from the U.S. Supreme Court June 13, 1966.  We went to court within a week of that date.  Also interesting in retrospect, Hickson, like his dad, later went on to become an attorney. 

Our court date was set and the plan was for us to plead no lo contendre.  The criminal attorney knew the judge and assured us that the case would be dismissed and the record expunged.

The five of us arrived at criminal court, sat together in the back row to wait, as our attorneys had arranged with the judge for us to go last.  Soon the judge entered the court and things got started. 

Wilson was seated next to me and said, "The judge is a woman, we're screwed.  School's out.  Shit, why did it have to be woman?"

I said, "You think so?"

Wilson said, "If she has to listen to the old lady that filed the complaint, there's no way in hell she's gonna give us a pass."

Wilson's opinion gave me concern.  Wilson came to Occidental from Rapid City High School in South Dakota.  According to Wilson, Rapid City sat next to Ellsworth Air Force Base with its minute man missile silos, and was the Russians' number two target in the USA. It was less than four years since the Cuban Missile Crisis and nuclear annihilation seemed more likely then than now.  During the summers, Wilson worked as a heavy equipment operator for his dad's construction outfit.  After Occidental, Wilson finished law school and began working as an attorney in Denver.  He soon realized he preferred driving bulldozers and went back to work for his dad.

We sat through numerous hearings where, what looked like the scum of the earth, was having their trial dates set.  Finally it was our turn, the Ave 47 gang.  The judge signaled to our lawyers and the three of them went through a back door to talk things over in her chambers.  After a few minutes, we started to hear the three of them laughing through the door.  We all took this as a good sign and exchanged smiles, even Wilson.

The laughter continued on and off for several minutes until the judge and our lawyers returned to the court room.  We were told to come forward and stand in front of the judge.  I don't remember a word she said except that at the end she fined us $75 a piece, and all of a sudden I wanted to know what was so fucking funny about $75. 

Everything else went as expected, case dismissed and record expunged, but no one had ever said anything to me about $75.  Hickson's dad and the criminal lawyer were tickled pink that things had gone just as they had planned.  At first I thought, surely Hickson's dad is going to spring for it.  None of this would have ever happened if Hickson had kept his mouth shut, let alone spun some tale about us making calls all the time.  I wanted to say, "Wait just a Goddamn minute," but I didn't.  I thought then as I do now, there are times when you shouldn't have to say anything.  Then the five of us and our two lawyers were shaking hands and saying our goodbyes.  When everyone had gone, I stood there talking to my self, "I'll be a son of a bitch." wondering if I had enough money to get my car out of the parking lot.