One of Those Days – 5/4/2020

Many of you know that May the 5th is Cinco de Mayo.  How many of you know what the day before that is?  OK, OK, yes, it’s May the 4th, but it’s more than that, as residents of Lethbridge, Alberta, Canada found out recently.

The Lethbridge Police Department received a 911 report that an armed person was walking around outside a local business, gesticulating, and yelling at people driving by.

The police force jumped into action.

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The month of May this year, in Canada as in the U.S., has been a time of sheltering-in-place to comply with the stay-at-home order.  Like many businesses, the Coco Vanilla Galactic Cantina had been struggling to keep its doors open in the time of COVID 19.  A gun wielding crazy could be the last straw that put them out of business.

A force from Lethbridge’s police department quickly arrived at the pizza place and leaped out of their vehicles.  They were wearing body armor and brandishing their own firearms.

The suspect, who had been striding back and forth in front of the restaurant waving a weapon and shouting at passers-by, stopped moving and started yelling…at the cops.

“Drop the weapon and get on the ground!” they ordered.

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The weapon clattered to the concrete, but the armored suspect began gesticulating and yelling even more.

“Get on the ground!” the force spokesperson yelled.

Armor clad arms waved and the suspect protested loudly.

Things were getting tense.

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Carefully judging how far the person was from the weapon, three officers began to move closer.  The armored person slowly began to kneel but didn’t seem willing to lie face down.  So they took the perpetrator down forcibly.

They ripped the culprit’s helmet off to make identification easier.  At some point, the suspect sustained a bloody nose and some other minor injuries.

The owner of the establishment, Brad Whalen, came out of the building and started shouting.

Police ordered him to stay back.  Despite their warnings, he continued to yell, “It’s a plastic gun!  Are you kidding me?”

What the…what?!

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Once the suspect was subdued and handcuffed, one of the gun-bearing officers of Lethbridge Police Force moved toward Whalen, who vehemently explained that the armored person they had just slapped handcuffs on was one of his employees.  She was wearing the Imperial Stormtrooper costume and carrying the appropriate plastic blaster in an attempt to drum up some business for the Star Wars themed pizza place.  Star Wars music played in the background.

Whalen had come up with the idea because May the 4th is widely known as Star Wars day, as in, “May the 4th be with you.”

Once the officers established that the blaster was not a real one, the poor young lady’s cuffs were taken off and she was questioned, then released.

A public uproar quickly followed.  People couldn’t understand why the cops wouldn’t instantly recognize the Stormtrooper costume and see the plastic blaster and realize how harmless the situation actually was.

I don’t agree.  You see, I’ve seen the original Star Wars several times.  In that classic movie, the Stormtroopers outside the cantina were there to arrest Jedi knights and members of the rebellion, like Obi-wan Kenobi and Luke Skywalker.  Maybe Lethbridge’s finest just wanted to help Obi-wan and Luke make a clean getaway.

So, you could say the force wasn’t with the poor costumed lady that day, but I guess the (police) force did show up.

Sorry.  I couldn’t help myself.

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