37 Years Ago - A Date with The Police ... and the police

Image from http://www.thepolicewiki.org

Realized that it was 37 years ago today, April 6, 1982, when I saw The Police at Riverfront Coliseum in Cincinnati, Ohio.  I also spent time 37 years ago inside a locked room at the police station in downtown Cincy; thereby nearly missing the show. 

Let me explain ....

First, let me get this out of the way - I remember wanting to go see this show *not* because of The Police, who I was mildly interested in seeing, but because Joan Jett & the Blackhearts were opening.  The weird thing is, I swear that Cheap Trick also played at this show, but for the life of me I cannot locate any details showing this to be the case.  There was definitely another band opening before Jett and The Police however, and if my memory is correct, it was them, who I had already seen once, but wanted to see again.

So, hey - $11 to see three bands, and if nothing else to say that I saw The Police at a career-high?  Sounds good.

As it happened, there were two shows that April in 1982 to see: this one and one in Columbus at the Agora for a solo Todd Rnndgren concert later in April.  This was all cool to me, as I was about to turn 18 the third week of April, so the idea of getting to go to two big shows could not have been better (the Rundgren show was filmed for airing on the Qube cable channel, but more on that another time). But keep in mind, however, that I was still only 17 at the time I drove down to Cincinnati from Fairborn.  I mention this, as it comes back into play here in a bit.

With me was my brother. Being older than me, normally he would have been the driver to such an event, but for various reasons (namely that of him knowing that having a few beers at the show would not affect the ride back if I was the one behind the wheel), I drove. Although I was a careful driver, I admit that I had been involved in one minor fender-bender and ticketed once for an illegal turn (which was surprisingly thrown out of court). Still, I stuck to the speed limit and was careful about using my turn-signals, etc., etc.

Yet, no matter how cautious you were, it was easy to get ticketed on the off-ramp we always used from I-71 to get to Riverfront Stadium and the Coliseum in Cincinnati.  That's because it was a classic example of a speed-trap: the speed limit for the ramp was 30 MPH from a highway that was posted for 55 MPH.  There was no delay between the speed of the highway and the off-ramp, so if you were trying to get off at that exit during the day - especially rush hour, as we were - and didn't want to cause an accident by slamming on your breaks, you were bound to be going at least 50 when you hit this exit. That's just the way it was.  So you hoped the cops were not waiting there at the beginning of the ramp, because it was impossible, and they knew it.

As it was, we got to the ramp and the cops were there.  On the bright side, they had already pulled over another car.  On the not-so-bright side, an officer saw me slowing down and immediately motioned for me to pull over as well. And on perhaps the even-not-much-brighter side, I pulled over.

Now, one thing I have consistently run into over the years when stopped for one reason or another by a police officer is that - thanks to my hearing difficulties and a slight speech impediment due to losing much of my hearing at an early age - cops believe I'm always drunk when they talk to me. As I don't drink this usually ends up with me walking a straight line, starring at a violently moving pencil, blowing up balloons, and all the other fun things you get to do when taking a sobriety test.  Fine by me, as I always knew I wasn't going to fail these test, and always it would end up being a case of a deflated police officer telling me to drive carefully as they send me on my way.

So we get stopped and the first thing the officer says after I greet him at the window is "Get out of the car."

And thus began another series of testing.  And no results.  Still, they caught me going 48 in a 30 MPH zone.  Same as with the kid in the other car that they had stopped.  In fact, we were both driving with someone else to Riverfront Coliseum to see The Police that night, and - oddly enough - we were both just two weeks away from turning 18, and both from outside of the county where Cincinnati is located.

My thoughts at the time were, "This stinks, but they'll write us both up for speeding and then let us go and we'll still get to the show in time."  After all, it was only 5:30 and the show didn't start until 7:30, so we'd still have time to get some dinner at Burger Chef or such and hit the show.

That didn't quite happen.  Instead, the police officers huddled for a time and then they came back to us and told me and the driver of the other car to follow them to the police station downtown.  For those who don't know Cincy, getting downtown is not just a quick turn-off from the highway.  You drive for a bit to get there ... and it also puts you many, many blocks away from the stadium and coliseum on the riverfront.  Still, what can you say?  You can't simply say, "No, I'm sorry, but I have tickets to a concert.  I will have to meet you at another time.  Say, Tuesday?"

No, you follow the police vehicles to the station.

So we get there and the four of us were escorted into the station.  After asking us some questions, me and the driver of the other car were then taken to a rather large room with three chairs and a table and told to sit.  With nothing else to do, we made some small talk until an officer arrived to question us about who we were, where we were going, did we have drinking in mind, did we realize how fast we were going, how young we were (which wasn't a weird pick-up line, but leading to something to come), etc.  When he left, we both were a bit confused.  After all, it was simply speeding tickets we were talking about, as far as we knew.

Outside of the room, however, it was something else.  As I was later told by my brother, who remained outside with the passenger of the other car, the police officers were deciding how long they could detain us for being under 18 while speeding AND for being from outside of the county.  The officers decided that the two of us should spend the night in a holding cell while they figured out if they could book us for ... what, I could never quite decipher, as being 17 and out of county was hardly a crime ... but book us anyway. 

Of course, my brother's immediate concern was, "Great, I'm going to miss the concert."  Which just goes to show that siblings react in a typical fashion in such situations.

As they began preparing the paperwork to get us held over, their supervisor came out of his office and demanded to know why they were holding two under-aged kids in a locked briefing room in the building.  When they disclosed their plans to keep us there, he blasted them for being knuckleheads and demanded that they let us go.  Not with a ticket.  Not even a warning.  Just let us go.

Thus, we left the police station after nearly ending up in a cell and with just a few minutes to get to the concert before it began.  Fortunately, the other driver knew the streets of Cincy better than I did and we followed them - AT A PROPER SPEED, MIND YOU - to the coliseum.

By the time we got parked and found our seats, the opening band - be they Cheap Trick or someone else - were finishing their last number for the night.  We did get to see Joan Jett and The Police however, and somewhere I still have a t-shirt from that night which is now way too small for me to wear (and probably could fit my daughter now).

As to the show itself? Perhaps I was rattled by the whole thing with the police that I really don't remember much about the concert.  The only thing that has stuck with me is a story Sting told about writing Cincinnati as "Sin-Sinnati" at their hotel.  Why that stupid little story is the one I remember, I don't have any idea.  But that is my main memory of The Police.

But as for the police ... well, my other meetings with them were never quite as dramatic as that one.  Maybe close.  But that's a story for another time.