Posted on 01/20/2008 1:01:54 PM PST by TornadoAlley3
CLEARWATER, Fla. -- A 75-year-old woman was arrested at a Clearwater McDonald's drive-thru, because police say she wouldn't pull her car forward.
Authorities say Jean Merola, a grandmother of eight, was arrested for disorderly conduct after she refused an officer's orders to move her car while she waited for the coffee and fries she ordered at the drive-through window. Merola says the McDonald's employees told her to wait there for her food.
Merola was handcuffed behind her back and put in the cruiser.
Another officer arrived and took her to the Pinellas County Jail .
Merola says she was searched, photographed and fingerprinted.
Jail records show she was released about 90 minutes later on her own recognizance.
well, you can’t just have people blocking the drive-thru now can we?
Good! Happy to see the police cracking down on people blocking the drive-thu. After illegal immigration, it’s a major problem.
Good! Happy to see the police cracking down on people blocking the drive-thu. After illegal immigration, it’s a major problem.
Well, at least they didn’t taze Granny.
Why was the cop there in the first place and what business of his is it to run the parking lot??
“dont taze me, Sonny”
The cop must have been next in line.
Ever seen those signs, “For faster service, please have your money ready”?
How about granny puts one on her car, “For faster service, please have the food ready”?
Even in the rare case that someone working at MacDonald’s can speak English, nobody can understand what’s being said through those crappy speakers. This lady was 75 years old and probably didn’t have a clue what was being said. I’m not saying that because of her age, but because I don’t have a clue what’s being said at those places. The employees are uneducated and rude, service is non-existent. I, too, wonder what led this stupid cop to handcuff and arrest her.
Where do they keeping hiring these people that flunked out of kinder-garden?
ah Police doing the tough work. meanwhile Jose and Miguel across the street kept mowing lawns.
You just have to learn a little Spanish:
“I want a hamberquesa grande y pappas.”
Say that and you’ll get a Big Mac with fries.
CLEARWATER, FLA—They say there’s a first time for everything but when Jean Merola, a 75-year-old grandmother and widow went to McDonald’s Thursday for her afternoon regimen of a decaf coffee and fries, she didn’t expect to be arrested by the Clearwater Police Department.
Merola, who’s never been arrested, wasn’t lovin’ it, sitting in the Pinellas County Jail after being handcuffed and charged with disorderly conduct by a police officer in line behind her at a Clearwater McDonald’s which is a short distance from her home.
The grandmother of eight drove her Lincoln Town car to the drive-thru window about 4 p.m. Thursday and ordered a decaf coffee and medium fries, hold the salt. In that saltless fries are a “special order”, she was told to pull ahead to an area of the parking lot where customers wait if their orders take a few minutes to prepare.
It still hasn’t been disclosed why Clearwater Police Officer Matthew Parco, 30, was behind Merola but as she sat in her car waiting for her fries, she heard a car horn being repeatedly sounded behind her. When she looked around, she saw the police cruiser and an officer waving his arms, apparently wanting her to move her car.
Next comes an issue of probable cause as Parco, obviously irritated with Merola when didn’t budge, got out of his patrol car, walked up to the driver’s side of her car and asked for her registration and license.
By this time, Merola was agitated too and told the rookie cop, on the job for about a year, that she hadn’t done anything wrong and wasn’t producing anything.
From there it went downhill and the officer’s report of the incident differs from Merola’s version. She says he argued with her about where she was parked and she shot back that she was parked where the McDonald’s staff had told her to park to await her order.
His report says her car was blocking people in line behind her and that he asked her to move her car ahead. She says that she doesn’t recall that and if anyone was blocking the line, it was him. She says she couldn’t have moved ahead because there was a curb in front of her.
Could this woman that’s waiting for her fries, parking in a designated area of the parking lot be demented? That’s what Parco told his supervisor who he called in Merola’s earshot and told that he thought Merola needed to be committed under the state’s Baker Act.
With that, Merola became offended and exercised her First Amendment rights and free speech, calling the cop a “brat”, a “smart ass” and a “dumb “s—t”.
Not to be dissed by a gray haired woman, Parco used his uniform and seemingly engaged in an abuse of power that has become all too prevalent across the county, Parco placed Merola under arrest for misdemeanor disorderly conduct, cuffed the elderly woman behind her back and placed her in the back of his patrol car, transporting her to jail.
Her car was impounded, costing her $160 and she says she sustained injuries to her shoulders and neck from being handcuffed for about an hour.
She says that while she respects police officers and brought her children up to respect the police that she doesn’t feel that Parco deserved her respect and that he hadn’t acted like a police officer should.
Similar unconstitutional arrests being made such as the Pennsylvania woman busted for swearing at her overflowing toilet and the man charged for writing an expressive opinion on his check paying a parking ticket fine have been shot down.
The Pennsylvania Superior Court has ruled that the “offense of disorderly conduct is not intended as a catchall for every act which annoys or disturbs people; it is not to be used as a dragnet for all the irritations which breed in the ferment of a community”.
The First Amendment would be applicable in Clearwater too. Merola was searched, fingerprinted and had her mug shot taken at the jail where she was held for several hours until she was released to her daughter and son-in-law.
The Clearwater mayor has reportedly called Merola and apologized, saying the incident shouldn’t have happened and is being investigated.
Perhaps if Merola sues for her unconstitutional arrest, the Clearwater PD isn’t going to be lovin’ it either.
http://www.northcountrygazette.org/news/2008/01/19/not_lovin_it/
Yeah. If this had been the Donut Drive-Thru Chain, they'd had the swat team there is no time!
Yeah, learn some Spanish. That way they can be rude to me in their own language. No thanks.
% Grandma got arrested at the drive-thru,
Waitin’ for her fries at Mickey-D’s
You can say there’s no such thing as justice,
But we just dropped the bail for her release... %
Usually, (I mean in about 99.9%) 'police tows' charge the customer about four times what Auto Club pays for the same exact service.
Twice in my previous career as a detective, I had to prepare 'termination' packages on dirty cops taking kick backs from tow operators.
Alas, management would never allow me to go after the crooked tow operators though.
We had a good strong cop union, but they ain't that strong!
Cops must obviously have nothing to do in that city. I can’t believe that they arrested her for that. I mean I could see her being stubborn as some elderly are but still...
Yeah, learn some Spanish. That way they can be rude to me in their own language. No thanks.
What I like is when they start speaking Spanish and they think I can’t understand because I am a dumb gringo and don’t understand that they are being rude to me and then suddenly you should see their faces when I come back with a snotty spanish prase. They get red in the face.
Unfortunately, lawsuits with big pay-outs are the only way to fight the rising tide of power-mad police and city/county/state/federal officials. Police chiefs will only curb stupid officers when jurisdictions have to repeatedly pay big settlements.
Why wasn't this dumb@ss immediately fired????
Wow. A line of cars in a drive thru? Having to wait behind the cars ahead of you? Theres an unusual development. /s
So by the same token if some Gort is behind me in the checkout line of Wal-Mart and I’m not moving fast enough...
The cop deserves a little vacation without pay......he can then go stand in line at McDs and wait for his food like everyone else. What a JERK.
“What a JERK.”
Indeed, grandma was a jerk. She was going to have to wait either way so why not pull up like all of us others have had to do. The little 3-year-old-like tantrum only served to hold people up, piss them off and put McDonalds behind. It would not get her food to her any faster.
I’ve seen this behavior plenty of times before in many different situations. Some people, namely some seniors, simply are not going to comply with the rules of common courtesy and don’t mind screwing over everybody in the building to get their way.
If this had been some young punk, the tone of this thread would have been completely different.
The cop deserves a LONG "vacation" without pay... He can then stand behind the counter and practice saying, "would you like fries with that?"
Mark
how old is YOUR mom?
Thanks for the laugh. I’m not as pleased that you made me snort while laughing, but hey: good with the bad and all that.
Buddy, I hate to say it but my Mom is one of the offenders. I get embarrassed going places with her these days. A recent trip to Graceland was the last straw. I have told my brother that she would get the cops called on her one day. I love the woman but dang!
In a situation similar to this article, when I was in school, I worked at a quick-lube place with 2 bays. An older woman and a young man pulled up to have some work done on his car. Despite two parking areas, he parked his car in one bay and she parked hers in front of the other. At the owner’s request, I asked her if I could move her car so other customers could pull into a bay. I was going to do it for her.
In the process of doing this I was chewed a new one by this “lady”. She let me know, in no uncertain terms that she was a paying customer and she could do what the hell she wanted and no kid was going to tell her differently. Never mind I was 30 at the time. The young guy’s jaw almost hit the pavement. I could tell he was embarrassed as hell. When she went in to get a work order written up, the kid sneaked over and moved her car so other customers could get in.
I have seen this type of thing too often. That kind of behavior is unacceptable to me, regardless of the person’s age. We all have to live on this big marble together and should show a little courtesy and respect when asked, if not automatically.
at age 75 I will give her the leeway to stay put in the mcd’s line........call me tolerant, but hey - I doubt she was the same lady from your story.
They would have tazed her at the donut shop!
-snip-
At the owner's request, I asked her if I could move her car so other customers could pull into a bay.
If the McD lady was told by the staff to wait there, then it is not a similiar situation.
Rosa Parks?
So are the people behind her, in whose way she was.
That's the object of drive up. I see a nice lawsuit in this.
All she had to do was to move to a parking spot nearby, and they would have taken her stuff to her car. That's how it works. Instead, she clogged up their driveway, and interfered with their business. And she refused to move.
No lawsuit there -- sounds to me like granny screwed the pooch by being stubborn to the point of stupidity.
No comment about the arrest — the later article (posted above) makes the cop sound pretty bad. But the woman should have just pulled forward as asked ... and nothing at all would have happened.
I am a baby boomer and I hate us. When we make up the entire elderly population we are going to be even worse than the 70-80 year olds taking advantage now. We are very bold with our feelings of entitlement.
The young cop acted foolishly as well and should have known better than to get tough with the old bag. He should have handled it with courtesy.
I think we will start seeing a lot of incidents like the one described.
His report says her car was blocking people in line behind her and that he asked her to move her car ahead. She says that she doesn’t recall that and if anyone was blocking the line, it was him. She says she couldn’t have moved ahead because there was a curb in front of her.
I'm not sure but from reading this excerpt, the woman may have pulled forward, but she may not have pulled forward far enough blocking the cop from getting around her, after he got his order? I've had this happen to me and I usually just bide my time, especially if I see it is a little old lady. This cop should be ashamed of himself.
I was recently reading up on the latest silliness perpetrated in the name of the "anti-social behaviour" laws in Britain, and it's truly amazing how far the British are going with this. Probably the silliest recent one was about some hedges growing too tall for the neighbors' taste: Powers being used to tackle high hedges .
She was trespassing on private property. The cops were doing their job. End of story.
Worth repeating.........
Where are you getting that? I saw nothing in the article to indicate she acted against the wishes of the McD staff.
The cops were doing their job. End of story.
Maybe not. According to one news report, the Clearwater mayor called Merola and apologized, saying the incident shouldn't have happened and is being investigated. (see post #15)
Damn intelligent women, had the stupid cop nailed.
In my experience, I've never seen the pick up lane for a fast food restaurant on a public way. There are, after all, black swans, I suppose. Even then, you can't park in toll lane, for instance.
According to one news report, the Clearwater mayor called Merola and apologized, saying the incident shouldn't have happened and is being investigated.
The Clearwater mayor may just possibly have been acting in the role of craven politician, not unflinching administrator of the law.
Some of our McDonalds, English is a second language and it is hard to communicate.
Do you have any evidence at all that McD's was involved in the dispute with Merola?
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