Tag Archives: crime in Dickinson North Dakota

Confronted By A Ranting Mentally Ill Person At A Gas Station In Dickinson North Dakota

July 18, 2021Uncategorizedbeing attacked in Dickinson North Dakota, crime in Dickinson North Dakota, is Dickinson North Dakota safe, Living in Dickinson, North Dakota, mentally ill street people in Dickinson North Dakota, Moving to Dickinson, North Dakota, pan-handlers in Dickinson North Dakota, relocating to Dickinson North Dakota, what is Dickinson North Dakota Like, which gas stations are safe in Dickinson North Dakota, would you move to Dickinson North Dakotaname withheld

During this past week, I wrote three blog post articles about a frightening experience that I had when I stopped in the small town of Mott, North Dakota at 12:10 a.m. to read a road map. Twice, someone emerged from the dark vacant street to approach my vehicle and I had to quickly drive away.

I went on and on about how I didn’t know what these people who approached my vehicle intended to do, I probably would have shot them if they had jumped inside my truck, I hadn’t been paying enough attention to my surroundings, why can’t the North Dakota DOT mark the routing for Highway 21 West with road signs so people don’t have to pull over in Mott to look at a map.

A person named Ray who lives in Maryland, who had been a long-haul truck driver for fifteen years, he wrote a comment a couple of days ago saying that in his experience, one of the most frequent places to be the victim of a robbery and/or assault is at a gas station while pumping fuel, getting out of your truck at a rest area, or using the public bathrooms at a rest area.

I believe that Ray pointed out, that while pumping fuel at a gas station, you have your hands full with the fuel hose and nozzle, and you are watching the pump to see how many gallons of fuel you are getting. At this moment, you are occupied with what you are doing, and aren’t able or inclined to drop what you are doing and walk away.

Today, Saturday afternoon, I went to a hardware store on the north side of Dickinson to buy several different bolts that were missing from a 1972 Yamaha motorcycle that I had just bought. I had to remove bolts from the motorcycle, take them inside the store, determine what size and thread series they were, buy something that was as close as possible to identical, and then go back outside and see if it fit correctly on the motorcycle, which I had in the back of my truck.

I had to go in and out of the hardware store about four times. On the fifth trip inside the store, some of the last things that I needed were 2-cycle motor oil, Heet fuel line water remover, and an engine air filter. When I found almost everything and went to the cashier to pay, there was an elderly gentleman who had decided that he would discuss a store catalogue of shelves with the cashier, not ask his questions to one of the two unoccupied floor-walkers, but take his time with the only cashier on duty. So I put the items that I needed down and I left, I couldn’t stand waiting and watching this unbelievable shelf consultation any longer.

I was hot, tired, hungry, and thirsty, but the next place that I went was a very busy auto parts store, where I bought the 2-cycle motor oil, and the Heet, but I forgot to buy a drink because I was trying to see if they had an engine air filter for my motorcycle. I made up my mind that I was going to go home, not look for an engine air filter anymore today, because I didn’t want to be around people anymore, I was in a bad mood.

I drove south, and I had to stop at the T-Rex Gas Station in the T-Rex Shopping Plaza to get fuel in my truck. The T-Rex Gas Station is in the middle of Dickinson, and it is one of the cleanest, safest gas stations in Dickinson. I parked on the outside of the very last gas pump, because I didn’t want to be around people, and I didn’t want to be blocked in.

After I had scanned my debit card, entered my debit card pin, got the pump to turn on, and began filling my truck tank, I noticed a man about 45-50 years of age, wearing an orange high-visibility construction worker shirt, walking across Main Avenue, yelling and ranting, heading in the general direction of this gas station.

From the middle of Main Avenue, and for the whole time he was walking, he did not cease yelling, cursing, and ranting. The first things that I could understand what he was saying, was something like, “They took everything from me, they took all of my shit.” I didn’t know if he had just been robbed, kicked out of where he lived by his housemates, if he had been evicted, or what.

It was hot outside, it must have been very uncomfortably hot walking on the street and pavement, especially if something bad had just happened to you, like you had all of your shit stolen. This guy continued to yell and curse, and he was now headed straight for me, with his fists clenched, his jaw clenched, the veins in his neck popping out.

From what he was yelling, it kind of appeared that he was looking to fight anyone that he came across at that moment. I was not in a good mood. I was not wanting to be approached by any pan-handlers asking for money, or anyone wanting to start an altercation. I became kind of enraged myself, to where I was not going to wait for this guy to get to me, I was wanting to beat the shit out of this guy before he even got to me. I thought what board or pipe did I have in the back of my truck to beat him with.

This guy changed course about 75 feet from me, and headed north. He began yelling, “I don’t care if I die, I don’t want to live anymore.”, and who knows what all else he was yelling. I was upset about this incident, this guy yelling non-stop, coming at me angrily like he was going to attack me, me wanting to beat the shit out of him, and then hearing him say that he didn’t want to live anymore.

It is not hard to say that this this man was mentally ill, the way that he was ranting the whole while he was walking. The way that he was behaving, the things that he was yelling, I don’t have much doubt that he was wanting to fight whoever he came across. Did he want to hurt someone, did he want to get into a fight, did he want to go to jail because he had no place else to go, did he want someone to hurt him so that he could sue them, did he want someone to shoot him and kill him?

Did he turn away from his approach towards me because he feared losing the fight, being blamed for the fight, or because he realized that the gas station had security cameras?

Even though I had decided 30 minutes prior to this that I was in a bad mood, didn’t want to be around people anymore, didn’t want to keep shopping for an air filter, just wanted to go home, parked at the farthest gas pump to not have to deal with people, if I would have not waited for this guy to walk up on me and hit me while I was between the gas pump and my truck, and knocked him down before he got that far, the Police and maybe even witnesses would have blamed me.

It would not have mattered how much I explained that I was stopped at the gas pump putting fuel in my vehicle, whereas this guy was crossing the street approaching me angrily yelling with clenched fists, he has no vehicle and no gas can, he had no reason to be walking all the way across Main Avenue to get here to this gas pump where I am, except to attack me, the Police Officer would probably arrest me if I knocked this guy down first. I wasn’t going to be slammed to the concrete first, I could see what was about to happen.

In the past, I have seen some mentally-ill strange acting people at the gas stations in downtown Dickinson, but usually not ever at this T-Rex gas station. I thought about it, the gas station beside the new Family Fare grocery store, on the north side of the interstate, near Menards, this gas station is not within a residential area, and has probably the least amount of pedestrians nearby, and probably the least amount of low-income people, so I will try to use this gas station from now on.

Note: For the past several years, I have noticed that many women will pull up to a gas pump, and not get out of their vehicle to pump gas until everyone close to them at the other pumps has finished pumping gas, gotten back in their vehicle, and left. I used to think that these women were being ridiculous, no one is going to grab hold of them and try to abduct them. Now I kind of see how they feel, they don’t want to be in the middle of pumping gas and have someone take this opportunity to approach them. Now that I think about it, many of these women get back inside their vehicle while the pump is running, they won’t even stand outside their vehicle.

Everyone In Dickinson Needs To Get Ready For A Huge Amount Of Theft

April 10, 2020Uncategorizedcrime in Dickinson North Dakota, drug crime in Dickinson North Dakota, guide to Dickinson North Dakota, how to prevent crime in Dickinson North Dakota, is there crime in Dickinson North Dakota, Living in Dickinson, North Dakota, Moving to Dickinson, North Dakota, neighborhood guide Dickinson North Dakota, relocating to Dickinson North Dakota, theft in Dickinson North Dakota, what is Dickinson North Dakota Like, would you move to Dickinson North Dakotaname withheld

For those of you who have never read my blog articles before, I have experienced a great deal of theft since moving to downtown Dickinson in the Spring of 2017. In my almost 51 years of being alive, I had more theft in Dickinson during these past three years, than in the entirety of my previous 48 years, living in eight different states.

In 2017 I had my truck stolen, with $2,500 worth of tools, equipment, and valuables in it. In 2018 I had a mountain bike stolen off the back of a different vehicle, by two people who used a rotary Dremel tool to cut through the cable lock, and a short time later someone cut through the cable lock on a different bicycle of mine parked in the apartment building bicycle rack.

In 2019 and 2020, one of my neighbors had a locked bicycle stolen on two different occasions, another neighbor had his vehicle luggage carrier stolen, one neighbor had his wallet with a week’s pay inside of it stolen from his vehicle parked in his driveway, an apartment neighbor had a revolver stolen from behind the backseat of his vehicle in the parking lot, another apartment neighbor had his stereo and speakers stolen from his vehicle in the parking lot. There were more thefts than this, it’s hard to remember them all, and many attempted thefts.

In 2018, I installed two security cameras outside of my apartment that record continuously. When I am home, I can usually see the video monitor that shows what is happening outside in the parking lot and out on the street beside my apartment building. Do these cameras record these thefts and attempted thefts, and do I give the video to the Police? Yes.

From watching the video monitor when I am home, from watching the video recordings of the thefts and attempted thefts, and being outside my apartment building, I can tell you what is happening and what to look for.

During the afternoon and evening, males between the ages of 17 to 30 walk the streets like they are trying to get somewhere, but if you watch them, watch what they are doing, and where they are going, you will see that the route that they are taking is not necessary or not getting them anywhere the quickest or most direct way. Nor are they going to or coming from a place of employment, store, or business.

When I am walking, I don’t walk as close as possible to parked vehicles, within inches, when the roadway and sidewalk is 40 feet wide, but I am not checking to see which vehicles have the door lock buttons pressed down, and what items are inside of parked vehicles. I also don’t walk holding my phone at chest height, video recording what is inside of parked vehicles on the street, but I am not planning on coming back late at night to steal things.

A few of my neighbors and myself, we have followed the people who have walked beside our vehicles recording what is inside of them, and we have called the Police. One time the Police did catch and arrest one of these people a short time later, for fleeing, eluding, resisting arrest, and other charges. Another time, by the time the Police arrived we couldn’t find the person, but a short while later another apartment resident caught this person in the fenced-off, utility corridor behind the apartment building, questioned them, and told them that they had to leave.

The thieving people are usually males between the ages of 17 to 30. They are usually drug addicts and drug users. They are unemployed, do not have steady employment, or do not have good employment. They live in low-rent apartment buildings, subdivided houses made into low-rent apartments, with their mom, or with their grandmother.

If they lived with their father or grandfather, these older males would say, “Oh no, you’re not going out at 1:00 a.m. to steal things in this neighborhood and bringing it back here.” But women, who knows, maybe they are either dumb or they play dumb, their little angel who has been arrested multiple times for theft and possession of drugs, he’s just going to visit his friends at 1:00 a.m., he’s not doing anything wrong.

Because the Police can’t be everywhere at once, and it is technically not illegal for unemployed, drug-addict, criminal record males to be walking the streets between midnight and 3:00 a.m., the Police have a hard time preventing or catching these thieves. And because mothers and grandmothers are either dumb or are playing dumb about the five bicycles, five car stereos, five laptop computers, and five mobile phones stashed in their garage or basement by their unemployed, drug addict son, the thieving continues.

In the past two days, I was out working on my vehicles during the afternoon and evening, and never ever before have I seen so many young males between the ages of 17 to 30 wearing hoodies, walking down the streets and sidewalks getting as close as they can to parked vehicles, and looking in parked vehicles. They were like moths or insects buzzing around and bumping into a porch light as far as cars parked out on the street.

This neighborhood that I live in is a bad neighborhood. It is mostly a blue-collar, lower-middle-class, poor, drug addict neighborhood. It’s the very low rent apartments, high number of subdivided homes made into low-rent apartments, poor single mothers and poor single grandmothers, that provide the habitat for these unemployed, drug addict, criminal record, thieving young males.

What can you do? Whenever you see a male between the ages of 17 to 30 walking down the street or riding a little BMX bicycle down the street in Dickinson, don’t try to think that they are going to or from work, going to the store, or going to visit a friend. They don’t have a job, they don’t have any money, and if they are going to visit someone’s house it is drug related. Watch what they do, watch where they are going, try to figure out where they are going or where they are coming from. They are out looking for anything that they can steal.

Make sure that every window and every door in your house or apartment is closed and locked. Before you go anywhere, and before you go to bed at night, make sure that all ground-floor doors and windows are closed and locked, especially in the basement, and the garage.

Install flood lights and motion activated lights to illuminate your front yard, back yard, and vehicle parking areas. Try to reduce the amount of possible concealment around your house, such as overgrown hedges, bushes, and shrubs. Do not leave anything outside during the day or night that would attract thieves, such as bicycles, lawn mowers, snow blowers, air compressors, chain saws, welders, motorcycles, fishing poles, golf clubs, ice chests, etc.

Apartment building owners and home owners need to install fencing not just to keep people who don’t belong from accessing their property, but to block off the backyard cut-throughs that neighborhood children create, but end up getting used by vagrants and thieves at 1:00 a.m.

Most importantly, start watching what passersby are doing in your neighborhood, and ask yourself what are they doing, do they belong here, do they have a reason for being here, do they look like they are actually trying to get somewhere, or do they seem to be here for some other purpose? If you see someone acting suspicious, let your neighbors know, so that they can watch too, put away their belongings, lock their vehicle doors, and start being more careful about locking up their house.

These young adults that you see walking around the streets in Dickinson, do not give them the benefit of the doubt anymore. You don’t have to stop and question them, just recognize that they are a threat, because so many people in Dickinson are drug addict thieves.

Is This A Case Of I Dindu Nuffin In Dickinson, North Dakota

January 28, 2020UncategorizedChelsey Borden Dickinson North Dakota, crime in Dickinson North Dakota, Dickinson Police Officer accused of excessive force, Living in Dickinson, North Dakota, Moving to Dickinson, North Dakota, Officer Chad Hopponen Dickinson North Dakota, police in Dickinson North Dakota, relocating to Dickinson North Dakota, what is Dickinson North Dakota Likename withheld

A 24 year old Dickinson resident, Chelsey Borden, has filed a complaint against Dickinson Police Officer Chad Hopponen alleging that the officer used excessive force in arresting her on January 18.

I will try to give a brief timeline of events as reported by the Dickinson Press newspaper in their January 23 article https://www.thedickinsonpress.com/news/4879312-Woman-accuses-Dickinson-officer-of-using-excessive-force-department-to-investigate .

On January 18 at approximately 1 a.m. Chelsey Borden left “Army’s West” sports bar and went to the Holiday gas station and convenience store located approximately two city blocks to the east.

Chelsey waited inside the Holiday convenience store and talked to the cashier while waiting for a friend of hers to arrive. When her friend arrived, Funmi Ujima, the two of them continued to talk together inside of the store.

Within a short time, another woman walked into the store, who was known to both Chelsey and the friend that Chelsey was talking to. Chelsey said that she had had problems with this woman before, and that this woman began to argue, act aggressive, and then this woman physically attacked her.

A physical fight ensued, and Dickinson Police Officer Chad Hopponen arrived while this physical fight was still in progress.

The above timeline is roughly what happened, the bare facts. For the rest of the story, Chelsey Borden has her version, and Police Officer Chad Hopponen has his version.

Chelsey’s Version:

Chelsey said that the other woman pushed her, took a swing at her, and that she was only trying to defend herself when Police Officer Hopponen arrived. Chelsey said that Officer Hopponen yelled at her, put his finger in her face, yelled at her to put her fucking hands behind her back, and yelled at her to fucking get down on the floor.

Chelsey’s quote from the Dickinson Press then said at this point, that Chelsey put her hands up, and said, Sir, please calm down, and let me explain what happened. Then, “Without notice or warning he swiped at my face and aggressively forced me to the ground causing my injuries,” she said. “I was thrown into the back of Officer Hopponen’s police cruiser, and he never asked me what happened or listened to my pleas for him to loosen the cuffs, which left bruises on my wrists to this day.”

Some of Chelsey’s complaints are, the Police Officer used excessive force, she suffered a cut on her cheek, she suffered bruising because the handcuffs were used improperly, and the Police Officer didn’t use the training he was taught for de-escalation.

The Police/Officer Chad Hopponen’s version:

The Dickinson Police stated that they do not want to discuss this arrest prior to the completion of both the criminal case and their internal investigation of Police Officer Chad Hopponen, beyond a few initial statements. “According to police, Borden was arrested shortly after 1:30 a.m. inside the store for what police say was disorderly and tumultuous behavior. Police say Borden resisted the officer’s attempts to gain compliance and take her into custody.” “Capt. Joe Cianni, Dickinson Police Department, said that the altercation and subsequent arrest were captured on audio and video footage.”

The Dickinson Press newspaper article covering this incident was fairly well written, it was detailed, and thorough. I wouldn’t say that it was leaning in either Chelsey Borden’s favor or Police Officer Chad Hopponen’s favor, but this article does not include Police Officer Chad Hopponen’s observations, assessments, or opinions, only Chelsey’s.

In a way, this Dickinson Press newspaper story is one-sided, because Police Officer Chad Hopponen wasn’t able to tell his side of the story. Many months from now, probably not until the criminal case against Chelsey Borden is concluded, the video and audio, of the altercation and the arrest will be made public.

I am writing about this news story, because I am angry about it. I want to point out what is not being told. Someone called the Police that night, it was probably the Holiday convenience store clerk. Everything was not going along fine, everything was not going O.K., there was an argument and then a physical fight between two people at 1:30 a.m. inside the store.

Whoever called the Dickinson Police Department, they didn’t just say that there was a fight inside the Holiday convenience store, the Police Dispatcher asks the caller to explain who is fighting, give a description, what are they wearing, are there any weapons, what is happening. I believe that it is likely that the caller told the dispatcher who attacked who, and who was hitting who.

Something else that is not being told, is that there was probably alcohol involved. It was 1:30 a.m. following a Friday night, Chelsey had just come from a bar, one or more of the parties involved had probably been drinking alcohol. Stop and think about it, when was the last time that you saw a fist-fight between two women at the Family Dollar or Family Fare grocery store during the day? This is not normal behavior.

My opinion is that when Officer Hopponen arrived at the Holiday convenience store, the Police Dispatcher had already given a description of the aggressor to the Police Officer, based on the information that was given by the caller. Or, that based on what Officer Hopponen saw as he approached, he was able to determine who the aggressor appeared to be.

I believe that Officer Hopponen encountered two very angry, combative, aggressive women who were currently engaged in a fist-fight inside the store. My opinion is, that one or both of the women were probably under the influence of alcohol, were not using normal judgement, and were not complying with Officer Hopponen’s instructions.

In Chelsey’s statements to the Dickinson Press reporter, she said that she was being yelled at by Officer Hopponen to put her fucking hands behind her back, and fucking get down on the floor, but instead of doing what he asked, she stood there with her hands up, saying let me explain.

When Police Officers arrive somewhere to possibly make an arrest, they do not know if the people that they are dealing with have any weapons on their person, such as a knife or a firearm. They would like to have compliance in handcuffing the person, rather than resistance or refusal, because they do not know if the person is armed or what they will do next. Failing to comply with the Police Officer’s request, means more to the Police Officer than just a difference of opinion, it poses a threat to the Police Officer.

Chelsey said that Officer Hopponen should have used his de-escalation training. He wasn’t trying to de-escalate, he was trying to make an arrest, take someone into custody, and transport them to jail. De-escalation, what does that mean in this case, not being arrested, not being taken to jail, and not having two misdemeanor charges on your record?

Prior to publishing this blog post article, I went to the North Dakota Court Repository internet site, and typed in “Chelsey Borden” for Stark County criminal cases. There is no record of her arrest, which probably means that the prosecutor or the police have dropped the charges against her.

Once the internal Dickinson Police Department investigation of Officer Chad Hopponen has been completed, the Dickinson Police said that the audio and video of the altercation and the arrest will be released to the public upon request. I am very interested to see and hear what happened.

What Is Happening To The Stolen Bicycles In Dickinson, North Dakota

January 22, 2020Uncategorizedbicycle theft in Dickinson North Dakota, bike stolen in Dickinson North Dakota, crime in Dickinson North Dakota, Living in Dickinson, North Dakota, Moving to Dickinson, North Dakota, relocating to Dickinson North Dakota, stolen bicycles in Bismarck North Dakota, theft in Dickinson North Dakota, what is Dickinson North Dakota Like, would you move to Dickinson North Dakotaname withheld

Between 8 p.m. Sunday night and 4 a.m. Monday morning, someone cut the chain on my neighbor Matt’s bicycle in his front yard, and stole it. This is the second bicycle that has been stolen from my neighbor Matt in this past year.

This most recent bicycle that was stolen from Matt was only worth about $100. However the previous bicycle that was stolen from Matt was worth about $500 to $2,000 because it was a very good condition mountain bike that was a rare, collectible bicycle, that there are very few of in existence.

Six months ago I had my white color Mongoose mountain bicycle stolen where I live in downtown Dickinson. This bicycle had a 1/2″ diameter steel Master Lock cable going through its frame and tires. The thieves made an unsuccessful attempt, then came back one week later with a Dremel type cutting disk, and cut through the steel cable. I say “thieves”, because there were two of them, the theft was recorded by my security camera.

The Mongoose mountain bicycle that was stolen from me was rare. In the seven years that I owned it, I never ever saw another one like it where I bought it in Texas, or in Idaho, Utah, and North Dakota where I was living. It had a white frame, with green/black accents, and green/black parts.

My white Mongoose bicycle, and especially Matt’s rare, collectible bicycle, could not be painted without destroying the value. Even if my stolen bicycle, or Matt’s stolen bicycle were painted, we would still be able to recognize our bicycles. The point is, whoever stole our bicycles, can’t ride them or try to sell them in Dickinson, and they know it.

Unpainted, at a glance I could recognize my stolen Mongoose bicycle 1/8 mile away on the street, driving by a yard, porch, or open garage. Matt could recognize his stolen bicycle the same as I could identify mine. Either one of us spotting our stolen bicycles would result in us stopping the rider, going up to where it was located, talking to whoever had it, and then calling the Police.

It became apparent that these stolen bicycles aren’t being sold or ridden in Dickinson. I will explain again, that these are not kids doing this. The thieves recorded by my security camera stealing my bicycle were not kids. Kids don’t come out at 2:00 a.m. with large bolt cutters and Dremel tools, to cut chains and lock cables.

In any case, even if it were kids who were stealing our bicycles, they are not selling them or riding them in Dickinson. These stolen bicycles are being stored somewhere, out of sight, in someplace like a backyard with concealment, a basement, garage, utility shed, house, trailer, or van.

There would be no point in stealing these bicycles if the thieves couldn’t sell them or ride them in Dickinson. The thieves must be taking these stolen bicycles to some place like Bismarck. Bismarck is the closest large city, 100 miles to the east.

The four hour, 200 mile round trip to Bismarck with stolen bicycles wouldn’t be worth the time and the cost of the trip, unless the thieves had more than several stolen bicycles to sell. This means that the thieves have to be using either a van or an enclosed utility trailer to make the trip to Bismarck, or wherever they are traveling to sell these stolen bicycles.

Is has occurred to me, and other people have commented to me, that it should not be that difficult for the Police in Dickinson to find out who has a van load or trailer load full of stolen bicycles. They just have to catch the bicycle thief one time, or a neighbor has to see this happening and report it, or a criminal in custody has to snitch, or an informant has to tell, and then its over for this bicycle theft ring of criminals.

It’s kind of like the Police in Dickinson are allowing this to happen, like this is harmless. I wonder if the Police in Dickinson aren’t using some kind of logic like, “If we let these people steal small things, and commit small crimes, then they won’t have to commit big crimes like armed robbery.”

I wish that the Police in Dickinson would try to stop all crime, and not have any tolerance for any crime. But, crime in Dickinson is not entirely the fault of the Police. The Judges and the Department of Corrections keep letting all the criminals loose on parole/probation instead of jail/prison.

The People, Police, And Judges In Dickinson Need To Change Their Attitude About Crime

In 2017 through 2019, many times it seemed like the crime in Dickinson, North Dakota was out of control. I had never personally experienced very much crime in Dickinson until I moved to downtown Dickinson in the spring of 2017. Within a couple of months my pickup truck was stolen.

By making flyers with a photograph of my stolen truck, and handing these flyers out all over Dickinson and the neighboring towns, I eventually received some phone calls and leads about who had stolen my truck. I found out, the person who had stolen my truck, he very recently had been released from prison for vehicle theft, and that there was currently a warrant out for his arrest for possession of stolen property.

I got my truck back about a week after I found out who had it. In the process of trying to find my truck, I read the complete criminal record of the person who had it, and the criminal records of this person’s friends and associates. This was my introduction to the fact that Dickinson has a large amount of residents who are repeat, continual, habitual, life-long criminals.

One of the things that I used to try to locate my stolen truck and the person who had it, was Facebook. I looked at this person’s Facebook posts, the people that he was communicating with, who these people were, and where these people were located.

The Facebook posts and Facebook friends, showed that there were easily more than several hundred drug-user, drug-addict, thieving men and women in Dickinson who were not ashamed, and not intending to stop what they were doing. Their names were familiar from the weekly Dickinson Press newspaper articles “Crimes & Courts” and “Police Blotter”.

I had always been interested in reading the Dickinson Press newspaper articles on crime in Dickinson, reading the names of the people who were caught, and what they had been arrested for, to see if there was anyone that I knew, or to save their names in my memory in case I met them in the future. But after seeing all the drug-addicts/criminals on Facebook, seeing that they all loosely knew and associated with each other, reading their criminal records on the ND Court Repository, I learned that not only does Dickinson have a large permanent habitual criminal population, but from reading the Dickinson Press, I now saw that these people are continually arrested again, and again, and again, over and over, with no end in sight.

I wasn’t the only person who saw this. The parent company of the Dickinson Press newspaper, Forum Communications, their owners, editors, staff, and reporters noticed this too. In August of 2019, Forum Communications, through each of its newspapers published five articles on crime, courts, prisons, parole, and probation written by reporter Sam Easter. Here is the link to the gateway article: https://www.thedickinsonpress.com/news/crime-and-courts/4046635-Too-big-too-fast-North-Dakota’s-other-housing-problem

The reporter Sam Easter was so thorough and detailed in his newspaper articles, that I think many North Dakotans lost one of the main, most important observations and conclusions: There are so many habitual, repeat, life-long criminal offenders in North Dakota because they are not being sent to prison, or being kept in prison, because it costs $43,000 per year to keep them in prison, and only $1,700 per year to keep them on parole/probation.

For some of the families in the Dickinson area, a life of crime is just a lifestyle choice. To them, a little bit of marijuana, a little bit of methamphetamine, a little bit of heroin, some drug dealing, some stealing, some robbery, some check fraud, some assault, fleeing & eluding, probation, and violation of probation, make for a good way of life, that they pass on to their children.

When will you learn, to just put each of these fuckers in prison for ten, fifteen, twenty years, and just leave them there for their entire sentence? You think that it costs $43,000 per year to keep them in prison, how much does it end up costing when they are not in prison and breeding five to ten children who will be exactly like them? How much does it end up costing when they are not in prison and introduce 50 to 100 people to meth or heroin and get them addicted?

The People, the Police, and the Judges in Dickinson are too tolerant and lenient on crime. In the past in Dickinson, there probably were individuals who might have committed a crime only out of desperation, impulsiveness of youth, or drunkenness. Their criminal behavior might have been corrected by a short time in jail and probation. But this is generally not the case in Dickinson anymore, the people who are being arrested, have been arrested again, and again, and again with no indication that they are going to stop what they are doing.

The policy or practice of no jail time, suspended jail time, short jail time, and probation is sending a message to the hundreds of habitual repeat criminals in Dickinson that they have nothing to fear, they can keep right on doing what they have been doing.

The Thieving Continues In Downtown Dickinson, North Dakota

January 12, 2020Uncategorizedcrime in Dickinson North Dakota, Living in Dickinson, North Dakota, Moving to Dickinson, North Dakota, relocating to Dickinson North Dakota, what is Dickinson North Dakota Like, would you move to Dickinson North Dakotaname withheld

At this point, I have written approximately fifteen blog posts about the crime, drug use, drug dealing, theft, and vandalism in downtown Dickinson, North Dakota where I live.

I have covered what got stolen from me, how it got stolen, what got stolen from others, the security cameras I installed, videos from my security cameras, calling the Police, how the Police responded, who got caught, the “Drug House”, and the indicators of thieving about to take place.

In the past year, on four different occasions, myself and my neighbors witnessed people walking beside our vehicles with their cell phone held out in front of them, video recording what was inside our vehicles, so that they could review it later to determine whether the vehicle doors were locked, was there a car alarm, and what was worth stealing. One time this summer, the Police did catch and arrest one of these people about one hour after he was seen videoing our vehicles. He was arrested in our neighborhood following a domestic dispute, for fleeing, eluding, resisting arrest, and other charges.

The last three times that myself and my neighbors witnessed someone walking beside our vehicles while video recording, we followed them and watched them from a distance, trying to find out where they were going or where they lived. When we were spotted by these people while following them, these people did not show up on our city block again.

In the past, I have had some difficulty when I called the Dickinson Police dispatch, because what I was reporting to the dispatcher did not appear to be a crime to them, such as someone video recording what is inside of our vehicles, or someone who does not live in our apartment building walking around the parking lot. Now, I often hesitate to call the Police, because it mostly does not turn out well, the dispatcher does not understand what I am trying to tell them, why I am calling them, or what I want.

What I want, and why I am calling, is for the Police to come right now and hopefully catch these people in the act of doing what they are doing. Even if they don’t have any stolen property on their person at the moment, the Police can at least get their I.D., learn who they are, and get a look at them so that they can recognize them in the future. If anything, this would at least be a deterrent to these people stealing in this neighborhood.

Yesterday at 3:00 p.m. I went outside of my apartment building to my vehicle. I needed to move some tools from one vehicle to another. At that time, I noticed a person wearing black pants, black jacket, and a black hoodie pulled up over their head. They had a bright orange scarf covering their face, and they were wearing a backpack that had a bright orange bottom.

When I first noticed this person, they were on the other side of the street from me, walking in a haphazard, hesitating manner. Because they were thin with a slight build, and they seemed to be unsure in what they were doing, I believed that this person was in their late teens. I have seen this behavior before, where a person walking on foot really does not have somewhere that they need to be, and they do not have somewhere that they are trying to get to, and they have no legitimate purpose for being in the area, they appear to be lost, uncertain where they are going, stopping, starting, looking around, hesitating, changing directions.

I stopped attempting to move any tools out of my vehicle, because this person was acting suspicious, and I didn’t want them to see that I had any property in my vehicle, or what I had. They crossed over to my side of the street, stopped, and looked at my apartment building entrance doors, and acted like they were going to try to enter onto the property. They began moving like they were going onto the property, then stopped, then changed direction to continue heading south on the sidewalk. Maybe they saw that there was a security system company sign on the apartment building door, or that there was a magnetic scanner and a magnetic lock on the door.

This seemed strange to me, for a person to briefly act like they intended to enter an apartment building after walking there, as if this was their destination, but then turn away and continue walking on, like this was not their destination.

The very next house that this person came to, was a large two-story house on a double lot that had a for “For Rent” sign out in front of it, that was currently vacant. This person stopped at the driveway, looked at the house, then stepped into the driveway a few steps, then came out and kept walking south on the sidewalk in a hesitating, halting, no destination, no business being in this neighborhood kind of way.

The next house that this person came to, it had a “For Rent” sign in front of it, and it was currently vacant. He stopped, waited, looked around, and then he walked up the driveway to this house. At this point I didn’t know if this person was looking for a vacant house to break into in order to have a place to stay, or looking for whatever he could steal from a house where there was no one home.

Readers from other parts of the country, or women, would probably like to interject that maybe this young man was looking for a house to rent. Dickinson is a town in the oil field of North Dakota. One bedroom apartments typically rent for $700 to $1,000 per month. There aren’t any teenagers renting 4BR/3BA houses in Dickinson.

I called the Police dispatcher, and I said that I wanted to report a suspicious acting person. I described what this person was doing, and I gave a description of the person. As I was explaining all of this to the Police dispatcher, this person exited the vacant rental house driveway, and began walking north, back toward the apartment building where I live.

I tried to watch and keep sight of this individual while I waited for the Police to show up. I saw that this person had now removed their bright orange scarf that was covering their face, and that they had now put their jacket on over top of the backpack that they were wearing. This person walked past the apartment building where I live, he turned the corner at the next cross street, and he continued walking west.

At the middle of this city block, there is a small employer-owned apartment building where only employees of this company live. This building is more like individually owned condominium units, because nothing is for rent, and only residents have access keys to enter this building. This building property and its small parking lot are dead-end, the building property abuts the yards and fences of the neighboring single-family homes. This is where the suspicious acting person turned into, and he walked through this and other people’s private property.

He cut through this apartment building dead-end private property, and about five minutes later, I saw that he was now back near the vacant rental house adjacent to the apartment building where I live. He continued walking east.

When the Police Officer arrived, about ten minutes after I had called the Police dispatch, the last time I had seen the suspicious acting person was about two minutes ago. I told the Police Officer what direction and street the person was walking on. The Police Officer drove around the neighborhood, but wasn’t finding him. I got in my vehicle and I drove around looking for him too, but I didn’t see him anywhere either.

I was upset and frustrated. If you lived in downtown Dickinson, and you had your vehicle stolen like I did, had $2,500 worth of tools and equipment stolen like I did, had your mountain bike stolen, had multiple attempted thefts of property like I did, your neighbors had their houses and vehicles broken into, and you kept seeing people walking by your vehicles video recording what was in them so that they could come back and steal it later, you wouldn’t like people who didn’t live on your city block and had no business being on your block, loitering around for no apparent reason other than to break into a house and steal.

Today, when I had the chance, I called my neighbor Matt to tell him that he needed to quit leaving his doors unlocked because I had seen a suspicious acting person wandering around the neighborhood yesterday. Matt said, “You know, it’s funny you should say that. Yesterday evening I thought that I heard noises coming from one of the vacant houses next door, like someone had gotten into one of them. I swore it sounded like someone was in there.”

Look For People With Phones Taking Pictures Of Your Property In Dickinson, North Dakota

September 15, 2019Uncategorizedcar break ins in Dickinson North Dakota, crime in Dickinson North Dakota, drug crime in Dickinson North Dakota, Living in Dickinson, North Dakota, Moving to Dickinson, North Dakota, relocating to Dickinson North Dakota, theft from vehicles in Dickinson North Dakota, theft in Dickinson North Dakota, what is Dickinson North Dakota Like, would you move to Dickinson North Dakotaname withheld

In May through July of this year, I had to telephone the Police in Dickinson about seven times due to the theft or attempted theft of my property, or other people’s property in downtown Dickinson where I live.

What my neighbors noticed in June, was that people would walk beside our vehicles with their phone held out in front of them or beside them, taking pictures of what was inside our vehicles.

In late June, one of my neighbors got in his vehicle, and he tried to follow and take a photo of one of the people who was doing this, but he tried to turn away, and get away in order to not be photographed. This particular person was arrested out on the street about three hours later for several different charges unrelated to the photographing of property inside people’s vehicles.

Since then, I have caught two other people photographing what was in the back of my truck or inside of my vehicle. In July, one of these people was a young, plump, red haired girl that was about 14 years old that was out walking her small dog. I was across the street sitting in my truck talking on the phone one evening, watching this girl walk around the corner and walk down the sidewalk, then she stopped at the back corner of my other vehicle, took her phone out, and began videoing what was inside this vehicle of mine.

I had to stop my phone call, quietly get out of my truck, crouch down below the roof of my other vehicle across the street, sneak over there, and when I stood up at the front corner of my vehicle, the very first thing that she did was try to hide her phone. I was not mean to her, I explained to her that I had had my property stolen from my vehicle recently, why was she videoing what was in my vehicle?

I waited for her to walk away and around the corner, then I drove down a parallel street, until I could see what house it was that she returned to. Was she spotting things to steal for an older brother, or do people pay kids to locate things to steal?

The second person that I caught videoing what was in my truck, was in late August. Me and my neighbor were working on his car on one side of the street, and I looked over to see a skinny man about 27 years old, walking on the other side of the street where there is no sidewalk, walking in the street, passing just an inch beside each vehicle, with his phone held out in front of him, pointing inside of these vehicles.

No, he was not on his phone having a conversation. No, he was not out getting some exercise. I waited for him to get to the next corner, where he made a right turn to head east. I got in my truck, and I followed him, staying about a block away. At the very next corner he made a right turn, to head south. When he got to the next corner, he saw me, and he stopped.

It appeared that he lived about one block away, whether it was the shitty house on the corner, or the apartment building across the street, I don’t know. But he saw me, and he knew, that I knew what he was doing.

For those of you who don’t know what I am talking about, people leave things in their vehicle: phone, phone charger, music CDs, wallet, purse, laptop computer, camera, radar detector, tools, etcetera. Rather than stand there for a minute looking through a car window at the dashboard, front seat, back seat, back window, and trying to determine what is there, what kind of stereo is there, what is it worth, is there a car alarm, the thief can just walk by with his phone and video everything in one pass. He can look at the video later to see what is inside each vehicle.

It appears, that if the people who are doing this are spotted and followed, especially if they are followed all the way back to where they live, and they realize that they have been followed, they temporarily give up their theft plans for that route where they were caught.

A Definitive Answer On Why There Is So Much Crime In Dickinson, North Dakota

I am sick of writing about the crime in Dickinson, North Dakota, and you are probably tired of reading about it. I began to find the definitive answer on why there is so much crime in Dickinson, but I hesitated to write about it, because I thought that it would be too difficult to explain, though the answer is simple.

I am going to refer readers to a series of recent articles, presented by the Dickinson Press newspaper, sponsored by the North Dakota Newspaper Association, where one of their journalists, Sam Easter, did a very thorough investigation on why there is so much crime in North Dakota. This journalist presented all of the facts and figures, but he didn’t shout the answer or conclusion loud enough, maybe he wasn’t permitted to do so because of the political implications. (refer to this link https://www.thedickinsonpress.com/news/crime-and-courts/4046635-Too-big-too-fast-North-Dakota’s-other-housing-problem, at the bottom of this article there is a link to all of the articles in this series.)

Here is the answer: In the late 1990s, the state of North Dakota made a deliberate transition from consistent stiff incarceration penalties for drug crimes and theft, to less incarceration penalties and more probation for offenders. The fact is, it costs the state of North Dakota about $43,000 per year to incarcerate an offender, versus about $1,700 per year to put an offender on probation.

These very high-up people in North Dakota government, like the Governors, Attorney Generals, and State Legislators, they tried to present to North Dakotans, that there needed to be more money spent on prisons. The North Dakotans were, unsurprisingly, too cheap and pinch-penny to want to spend more money on prisons.

In order to remain popular, and to get re-elected, the Governors, Attorney Generals, and State Legislators, they never came out and said, “Listen you dumb sons-of-bitches, if you don’t spend this money to build new prisons, you are going to be overrun with crime and criminals in your communities.”

Instead, the Governors, Attorney Generals, State Legislators, Judges, and Prosecuting Attorneys have implemented this “Probation for Everyone” policy, knowing full well that the communities would become overrun with criminals. Their belief was probably that once the ordinary citizens became tired of dealing with so much crime and so many criminals every day, that it would come to the point where North Dakotans would ask for more prisons to be built.

The Governors, Attorney Generals, State Legislators, Judges, Prosecuting Attorneys, Probation Officers, and Police Officers know why there is so much crime in Dickinson, North Dakota, but the problem is that the ordinary citizens don’t know.

The prisons in North Dakota are currently completely full, because new prisons have not been built. Because the prisons in North Dakota are full, with no room for additional prisoners, people who are convicted of drug crime and theft in North Dakota are given very little jail time, and probation.

Many of the Probation Officers in North Dakota have as many as 130 offenders to supervise on probation, because probation is given rather than incarceration. The Police in Dickinson have seen for years, that they can successfully arrest someone for possession of methamphetamine and possession of stolen property, the offender is released from jail on bail, the Police arrest this same offender again for another possession of meth and stolen property while they are out on bail awaiting trial, and in the end, this offender only ever spends a month total in jail, and gets probation.

When I looked up the person who stole my truck in 2017 on the North Dakota Court Repository, he should have still been in prison for an arson charge, while he was out committing multiple felony thefts, and he should have been in prison for these multiple felony thefts, while he was out stealing my truck. He was out of prison on probation, while he was caught in possession of stolen property, and he was out on bail for this possession of stolen property, when he stole my truck.

I e-mailed a judge who had adjudicated many of this thief’s criminal cases over the years to ask him why he kept suspending most of this person’s prison sentences, when this person kept repeating and repeating felony thefts again and again over the past twenty years, and this judge was outraged, and he told me to go ask the prosecutor.

If you read the Dickinson Press newspaper “Police Blotter” or “Crime and Courts” articles, and go look up the people named who have been charged with theft and possession of illegal drugs using the North Dakota Court Repository on the internet, you will almost always find that they are currently on probation for a previous charge of theft and possession of drugs, and in many cases they are currently out on bail awaiting trial for a previous arrest for theft and possession of drugs.

The Police in Dickinson arrest the same several hundred people for theft, possession of drugs, and drug dealing, over and over again, multiple times each year, because these offenders are not being incarcerated, they are being let out of jail almost immediately right back into Dickinson. Also, these repeat offenders have no fear of committing crime in Dickinson because their punishment is so lenient.

Oops, More Theft Where I Live In Downtown Dickinson, North Dakota

August 5, 2019Uncategorizedcrime in Dickinson North Dakota, crime in downtown Dickinson North Dakota, Living in Dickinson, North Dakota, Moving to Dickinson, North Dakota, relocating to Dickinson North Dakota, what is Dickinson North Dakota Like, would you move to Dickinson North Dakotaname withheld

I got tired of writing about, and my readers got tired of hearing about the successful thefts and attempted thefts where I live in downtown Dickinson during May, June, and July.

The last theft that I covered, was the primer-grey color Honda Civic that got stolen from the Drug House at the end of the street where I live on July 14.

On Sunday July 28, my neighbor found a person’s driver’s license laying in the street near the corner of the city block that we live on. The address on the driver’s license was a residence one city-block to the north, so he walked to that address, and he knocked on the door, in order to return this driver’s license.

The person who answered the door, he said that on Saturday night or early Sunday morning, someone saw his wallet laying on the front seat of his car, that was parked in his driveway. He said that a thief broke into his car, and took his wallet, which had $600 cash inside of it.

Because the wallet was gone through, and the contents were thrown on the ground, as the thief walked down the street in front of the apartment building where I live early Sunday morning, I was going to offer to go through my security camera footage to see if it showed the thief walking down the street early in the morning.

On Sunday evening when I went to the house where the wallet was stolen, the guy wasn’t home. His neighbors were home, and they said to me, “Maybe that was the same guy who stole the phone charger out of our car, who accidentally left his flashlight behind.” I asked when did this happen, and the neighbors said late Saturday night or early Sunday morning.

It looks like the guy who had his wallet stolen, he didn’t even call the Police to report that his car was broken into and his wallet was stolen, because his neighbors didn’t even know that it had happened. If the neighbors hadn’t picked up and handled the flashlight that the thief accidentally left behind, the Police could have probably gotten his fingerprints off of it.

From what I can tell at this point, it looks like the Dickinson Police Officers who are on patrol duty, they aren’t collecting and piecing together the evidence from reports to lead them to or narrow down the suspects in these thefts in the neighborhood where I live. It doesn’t look like there is any Police Detective who is doing this either, since there is only one or two detectives in the City of Dickinson Police Department.

It looks like the Police are depending on informants leading them to the thief and/or the stolen property, or they are hoping to catch the thief in the act one night. A few of us neighbors believe that we are going to have to catch this thief ourselves in order to stop the thefts in our neighborhood.

From everything that has happened recently, my belief now is that the thief lives one city block over, to the east. He can’t steal things on the street that he lives on, because he could end up getting chased right to the place where he lives. He has to walk at least one block away to steal things, so that he has a chance to run between houses and through people’s backyards, before he tries to make it to where he lives.

The Sad And Tragic Story Of Who This Drug Addict Girl Is, In Dickinson, North Dakota

In my previous blog post I described how I came to meet a drug addict girl, who I will call “Teresa”, following the theft of my property in downtown Dickinson where I live. In late June, Teresa came walking down the street from the Drug House where she lived, to where I was, working on my vehicle parked on the street beside the apartment building where I live.

At first, I was interested in talking to Teresa, in order to try to find out who had stolen my bicycle in the beginning of June. The longer that I talked to her, I began to notice that she was good looking, in a way that most women in Dickinson are not. She was very thin and muscular, with no body fat at all. But her appearance wasn’t from diet and exercise, it was from drug use and not eating.

Because of the way that Teresa looked, and because she was so forward with me, I was attracted to her, and I wanted to have sex with her. Her whole reason for walking up from the Drug House and talking to me, was probably to see if I had any interest in her, because she needed help.

I knew from talking to the landlord of the Drug House a day or two earlier, that Teresa was likely one of the three people who were being evicted from the Drug House. Teresa told me that she was being evicted, but that she was going to court to fight her eviction.

It appeared that Teresa had no job, no income, no vehicle, and no money. I thought about how I could help her, but I also thought about how much trouble she could cause me. If I allowed her to stay in my apartment, sooner or later she or her friends would probably steal whatever they could from me. Or, she could make an abuse allegation against me, and the Police would likely arrest me and remove me from my own apartment.

I realized that if I wanted to know who Teresa really was, I could look up her landlord’s name on the North Dakota Court Repository website under Civil/Traffic court cases, where he would be the Plaintiff, and she would be the Defendant in a pending eviction court case.

I found Teresa’s real first and last name, plus a second first and last name that she sometimes uses, which comes from her middle name and a previous marriage last name. Using court records, LinkedIn, a wedding registry, company records, and Facebook, I was able to see a very sad and tragic story of who Teresa actually was:

Teresa grew up in, and graduated from high school, in a small town in Indiana. From 2000 to 2004 she attended and graduated from a good state university, receiving a Bachelor of Arts in political science.

While attending university she was employed in business administration, and she continued to have steady employment in business administration after she graduated from university. In her late twenties, with the amount of work experience and long-term steady employment that she had had, she probably earned $35,000 to $40,000 per year.

In 2010 Teresa moved to Virginia in order to attend a business college, to actually get a degree in Business Administration. With her previous extensive work experience in business administration, taking the additional classes in accounting, finance, marketing, human resources, and management, would probably allow her to begin earning $50,000 to $80,000 per year.

Her first semester at this business college in Virginia, Teresa met a fellow student in one of her classes, who had just gotten out of the military. Soon she became best friends with him, later she became engaged to him, and a couple of years later she had two children with him.

Her fiancee that she met at business college in Virginia, I will call him “Jeremy”. Jeremy had a good personality, he was funny, handsome, athletic, and in good physical condition. The photographs of Teresa and Jeremy from this time period at business college in Virginia, both of them about 30 years old, they looked very happy, and very healthy.

When Teresa and Jeremy graduated from business college in Virginia in 2013, soon after that, they moved to Dickinson, North Dakota, which was experiencing an oil boom. Teresa got a job in business administration in Dickinson, with a very large company, her job title was assistant manager. After about a year of working for this very large company in Dickinson, Teresa was promoted to manager.

As manager of this company, Teresa was responsible for the intake of about $200,000 to $300,000 per month, the deposits, the bookkeeping, some human resources, employee management, sales, marketing, public relations, dealing with customers, and more. She earned probably $60,000 to $70,000 per year.

From the civil and criminal court records that I saw, and from her Facebook timeline of photos and comments, it looks like everything began falling apart in approximately 2015. Teresa was no longer with Jeremy, the father of her two children, and it looked like she was no longer employed.

What I saw on Teresa’s Facebook page, was that she was “in-love” with her “soul-mate”, a convicted felon thief, drug addict, and drug dealer from Bowman, North Dakota. In her Facebook photos and comments, and in court records, from 2016 onward, it looked like she became completely immersed in a drug addict lifestyle.

Jeremy was awarded custody of their two children. Teresa was arrested for failure to appear in court, following an arrest for driving without a driver’s license. She was arrested for possession of marijuana. She was evicted by three different property management companies in Dickinson for failure to pay rent. She had four separate court judgments against her for $4,500, $2,000, $1,000, and $1,000.

What was shocking to me, was the contrast between the Teresa that had just graduated from business college, was the manager of a large company earning $60,000 to $80,000 per year, with a new Dodge Charger, with a home, a husband, and two young children, and the Teresa who was homeless, with no children, no job, and walking the streets of Dickinson looking for things to take out of garbage dumpsters.

It is said that a drug addiction is a mental illness. I don’t disagree that drug addiction is a mental illness, but I think that Teresa must have had some kind of mental illness completely separate from trying, using, and becoming addicted to methamphetamine. The reason why I say this, is how in two or three years of using meth, could she not see that she had lost her job, her career, her home, her husband, her children, her friends, and was living on the street, and not want to change? The women’s shelter and rehabilitation is just one mile away.

I couldn’t believe how far Teresa had fallen. But I had to tell myself, how in the world could I help her or deal with her, don’t I realize that her husband, her family, her employer, and her friends must have all tried to help her?

Probably one of the biggest obstacles to Teresa leaving this drug addict lifestyle, is her “soul-mate” boyfriend, who despite being arrested for felony theft and felony drug possession with intent to deliver during this past year, he is not in jail, but on probation. I don’t know when the judges in Dickinson will understand that allowing convicted felon drug dealers to walk around free in Dickinson, is not a good idea, and not helpful to anyone.

The Drug House In Dickinson, North Dakota

July 22, 2019Uncategorizedbicycle theft in Dickinson North Dakota, crime in Dickinson North Dakota, drug addicts in Dickinson North Dakota, drug crime in Dickinson North Dakota, guide to Dickinson North Dakota, Living in Dickinson, North Dakota, meth addiction in Dickinson North Dakota, Moving to Dickinson, North Dakota, relocating to Dickinson North Dakota, theft in Dickinson North Dakota, what is Dickinson North Dakota Like, would you move to Dickinson North Dakotaname withheld

Each of my previous four blog posts have been primarily about the attempted theft and successful theft of my property in downtown Dickinson, North Dakota where I live. I would like to get off of this subject, but I can’t, because this shit keeps on happening, faster than I can even write about it.

Beginning on May 27, 2019 when I found my white color Mongoose Mountain Bicycle hanging from its bicycle cable-lock off the back of my truck parked where I live, my neighbors in the apartment building where I live, and my neighbors living in the houses in this area, they all told me that they believed that it was the people in the “Drug House” at the end of the street that were responsible for all of the crime in our neighborhood.

It was pointed out to me again and again by my neighbors, that the Dickinson Police are at the “Drug House” nearly every day. If you watch what goes on down there, the Police are at this house looking for suspects, looking for stolen property, serving arrest warrants and arresting people, serving search warrants and arresting people for possession of illegal drugs and stolen property, serving eviction notices, evicting people, and responding to disputes.

Having observed all of the Police activity at the “Drug House” that goes on daily, people in our neighborhood have taken note of the individuals that come and go from the Drug House all day long by vehicle, by bicycle, and on foot, and the people who sit or loiter outside of the Drug House.

Everyone in our neighborhood is suspicious and concerned when they see the residents and visitors of the Drug House parked in their vehicle, bicycling, or walking in the neighborhood, because they are worried that they are planning on stealing something or breaking into a vehicle or home. The parking, bicycling, and walking often appear to have no other purpose than spotting and planning things to steal.

Besides the successful theft of my white color Mongoose Mountain Bicycle, and the cutting through of the bicycle cable-lock on my red color Mongoose Mountain Bicycle, some of my neighbors have had a luggage rack stolen, a trailer hitch stolen, an expensive bicycle stolen, a baby stroller stolen, a car broken into, a house broken into, and most recently this past week a Honda Civic stolen.

Myself and all of my neighbors would like for this Drug House to be gone. Burning it down, bulldozing it down, getting a community grant to buy it and destroy it, or having the Building Inspector or Fire Marshall declare it uninhabitable are options that have been considered.

I talked to the property manager of the apartment building where I live about the thefts that I have had, which appear to be caused by people walking up the street from the Drug House. He looked up the owner of the Drug House, put the office phone on speaker, and called the owner of the Drug House while I was sitting there. When the phone picked up, he said, “Hey John, I think that you have got a drug problem going on at the house that you own.” John said without hesitation, “Oh I know that I do.”

John, the owner of the Drug House, was an elderly man in his late 60s or 70s. He sounded tired and nearly worn out, almost exasperated. He explained that he had three evictions currently going on at this house, and that none of these people would leave. It appeared that it was never the elderly owner John’s intention to have rented to drug addicts and criminals.

Apparently, this Drug House was subdivided into small rental units, which are not very appealing, and they are very low rent, as low as $250 per month. People with a criminal record, drug addiction, no high school diploma, no job skills, who can’t get a job or can’t keep a job, with very little income, they rent a unit in the Drug House because this is one of the cheapest places in Dickinson.

After the theft of my white color Mongoose Mountain Bicycle on June 6, I drove around Dickinson looking for this bicycle. I stopped and talked to my neighbors, and I showed them photos of this stolen bicycle. And, I stopped at the Drug House several times to show the tenants and loiterers photos of my stolen bicycle.

The female residents of the Drug House were very receptive in hearing about my stolen bicycle and looking at photos. They would say how that was bad, they were sorry, and that they would keep an eye out for it. The male residents of the Drug House would say get the fuck out of here with that shit, we didn’t steal your bicycle.

On the night of June 25, when every Dickinson Patrol Officer on duty at the time had to respond to a dispute involving residents of the Drug House, after this things changed for a couple of weeks. The Police had to chase, taser, arrest, and take to jail an individual who was combative with them and non-compliant. Removing this individual from the Drug House seemed to help quiet things down for a while.

Several residents of the Drug House, and several visitors to the Drug House were detained and questioned by the Police. The visitors to the Drug House did not like being detained, identified, and questioned, and they quit going to the Drug House. The women residents of the Drug House didn’t like this either and they were upset about it.

In the days following this incident, when the women residents of the Drug House were still upset about this, I talked to them about everything that had been going on recently. Some of the residents of the Drug House were not renters, they were people who had no place to go, and they would not leave, this was the case for the person who got tased and arrested, his name was Steven.

Everything was quiet until the Honda Civic got stolen on Sunday morning July 14. Possibly or probably the worst thing to come from all of this, was that I started talking to the drug addict women, which I will explain in my next blog post.

June 15, 2019 Attempted Bicycle Theft In Downtown Dickinson, North Dakota

July 14, 2019Uncategorizedbicycle theft in Dickinson North Dakota, bike theft in Dickinson North Dakota, crime in Dickinson North Dakota, drug crime in Dickinson North Dakota, Living in Dickinson, North Dakota, Moving to Dickinson, North Dakota, relocating to Dickinson North Dakota, what is Dickinson North Dakota Like, would you move to Dickinson North Dakotaname withheld

My previous three blog posts have been about the successful theft and attempted theft of my property in downtown Dickinson, North Dakota on May 27, June 6, June 15, and June 25 of 2019.

In this blog post, I just want to explain and show the surveillance video from June 15 at 2:31 a.m. where an adult male walks up to my red color Mongoose Mountain Bicycle parked in the bicycle rack where I live. The 3/8″ steel bicycle cable-lock was found cut through on the morning of June 15, that is why I looked at the surveillance video from the previous night.

If you read my previous blog post, it describes the theft of my white color Mongoose Mountain Bicycle from the back of my vehicle parked where I live on June 6, where two adults cut through the 3/8″ steel bicycle cable-lock with a Dremel type tool. The white color Mongoose Mountain Bicycle I cared about, the red color Mongoose Mountain Bicycle I bought at a City of Dickinson Municipal Surplus Auction two years ago for about $30.

The Police Officer who came to talk to me after I reported this attempted theft on June 15, was Officer Bates. I later gave a copy of three surveillance videos showing the June 6 and June 15 incidents to Dickinson Police Officer Kinto, Officer Bates, and Sergeant Moser.

In this video, at the 02:31:00 time stamp, you will see an individual walk from the right side to the left side of the video screen. If you look closely at the white Chrysler 300, you will see this individual turn to walk in front of this car, to get to the bicycle rack, and then crouch down. Before viewing this surveillance video, click on the settings icon to select the highest video resolution 480p, and also expand this video to watch it on full-screen.

Why this individual didn’t take this red color Mongoose Mountain Bicycle at this time, I don’t know. Maybe because the tires did not have enough air in them to ride it. Maybe he got scared away by a barking dog at the house next door.

When I discussed the May 27, June 6, June 15, and June 25 theft or attempted thefts of my property in downtown Dickinson with neighbors in my apartment building, other people living in this neighborhood, and Dickinson Police Officers, everyone believed that the thieves were coming from the “Drug House” down the street. When an arrest was made of an individual who had been photographing the property in my truck on June 25, following a 911 call about a dispute involving several people, this individual and several other persons involved were residents of the “Drug House”.

It is not that the Dickinson Police Patrol Officers do not care about crime in this neighborhood, they have to go to this “Drug House” on average about once per day. There are drug investigations at this “Drug House” at least once per month, probably more often than that. The suspects are taken to jail, and within a few days they are out of jail, right back to the “Drug House”.

Why I Haven’t Written About Dickinson, North Dakota For A Month

I have not written about Dickinson, North Dakota for a month. This is the longest that I have gone in the past five years without writing anything. This has been one of the worst months of my life. Most of my problems involved being sick, my Siamese cat, going back to Idaho to work on my house, and thefts where I live in downtown Dickinson.

Everything that went wrong for me, was not nearly as important or consequential as the thefts of my property in downtown Dickinson, North Dakota. The last blog post that I wrote on May 27 titled “Early Morning Thefts In Downtown Dickinson, North Dakota”, turned out to be just the beginning.

On the morning of May 27, I found my white color Mongoose mountain bicycle hanging from it’s bicycle cable lock, with the front wheel undone, hanging off the back of my truck. I took Dickinson Police Officer Langler’s advice when he came to take a report, to purchase a security camera.

On the morning of June 6, I found that my white color Mongoose mountain bicycle was gone. The surveillance video showed two adults ride up on black BMX bicylces, cut through the bicycle cable lock, and ride off on my bicycle at 2:21 a.m. Dickinson Police Officer Kinto took a report on this theft.

On the morning of June 15, a neighbor found the bicycle cable lock cut through on my older red color Mongoose mountain bicycle parked in the bicycle rack. The surveillance video showed an adult walk up to this bicycle and crouch down beside it at 2:31 a.m. Dickinson Police Officer Bates took a report on this attempted theft where the bicycle cable lock was cut through.

On the evening of June 25 at 7:20 p.m., my neighbors observed an adult male taking pictures of what was in the back of my truck using his phone, apparently the set of four truck tires. The Dickinson Police were not very helpful at first when I was trying to explain this to them, they were especially not helpful when they later tasered this individual 100 feet from my truck when he was being combative and non-compliant with them, in regards to a dispute.

I tried to explain about the attempted theft and successful theft of my property on May 27, June 6, June 15, and at 7:20 p.m. this evening by this individual now in their custody in the back of their patrol vehicle to several Dickinson Police Officers standing there, but they didn’t want to hear about it, except for Officer Langler, who unfortunately had to leave on another call. I couldn’t believe it, I thought that I would have a very difficult time catching this person, and now that the Police had him in custody in their patrol vehicle, they didn’t want to hear about it.

The following morning, June 26, I was able to give a written statement and three surveillance videos to Dickinson Police Sergeant Moser who was in charge of the day shift, in the hope that the Dickinson Police Department could use all of this information with the dates, times, and videos to make some progress in theft investigations in Dickinson.

Dickinson Police Officers Langler, Kinto, Bates, and Moser were professional and they appeared to have a genuine interest in stopping the thefts in downtown Dickinson. But something is wrong beyond these specific instances of theft and attempted theft where I live in downtown Dickinson, something is wrong with the Mayor Scott Decker, the Police Chief Dusty Dassinger, the Judges, the City of Dickinson Commissioners, the long-time local residents, and the out of state workers in Dickinson.

I have lived in small towns, college towns, oil field towns, medium-sized towns, and big cities like Tampa, Phoenix, and Fort Worth. Dickinson has by far the worst theft and drug crime, and it only has a population of 25,000 people.

What I believe is the deliberate under-reporting of crime in Dickinson, is doing way more harm than good. If crime is really bad and out of control, let the people know, let the Mayor know, let the City Commissioners know, so that additional officers or detectives can be hired, or even ask for assistance from the State Police.

There seems to be some kind of unwritten understanding between Police Chief Dusty Dassinger, the Judges, and the thieves and drug addicts in Dickinson, that the theft of property is not that bad, drug activity is not that bad, as long as you don’t do anything violent, you’re O.K.

The behind the scenes attitude of Mayor Scott Decker, Police Chief Dusty Dassinger, the City of Dickinson Commissioners, and the Judges, that the city is just going to have to live with theft and drug crime, there isn’t much that you can do about it, let’s try to minimize the reporting of crime in Dickinson, we aren’t going to hire more Police Officers, let’s just try to make it through these post oil boom years, and all of this will die off, ……..this attitude of allowing it, permitting it, and ignoring it is making Dickinson have the worst crime of anywhere I have ever lived in my life.

Early Morning Thefts In Downtown Dickinson, North Dakota

I spent a good part of Friday, Saturday, and Sunday during daylight hours, working on vehicles, getting things done, making progress. Each night I looked on the internet for parts, vehicle problems that were similar to what I had, and repairs that other people had done.

This morning, Memorial Day, when I went outside my apartment building to go to my truck, I saw that someone had tried to steal my mountain bike from the bed of my truck. I had a cable lock going through the bicycle frame and front wheel, because the front wheel has a quick-release lever. The front wheel was removed and hanging there, and the bike was pulled out and hanging there.

This really made me angry, for a whole bunch of reasons. I keep a lot of tools and equipment in my vehicles. I use these tools and equipment regularly, and they need to stay in my vehicle. Things like a battery jump start box, battery charger, digital multi-meter, compressed air tank, socket set, cordless tool set, dremel tools, other tools, spare tires, shop jack, and so forth. This truck got stolen in Dickinson in 2016, and $2,000 worth of tools and equipment were removed from it.

When this truck got stolen in Dickinson in 2016, the tools and equipment that were taken from it, plus the four new tires that were taken off of it, plus the time and money that I spent driving around from Richardton to New England to Belfield looking for my truck and handing out flyers, this all cost me a loss of about $3,000.

The person who stole my truck and later abandoned it, he is a long-time, well-known car thief in the Dickinson area, and a drug addict. He spends most of his time in jail and in prison. Getting arrested, being placed in jail, and going to prison are not a deterrent to him, nor will he ever, ever be able to pay any restitution for what he stole.

So now, I have a cable lock going through my truck steering wheel, a cable lock going through my spare tires, and a cable lock going through my mountain bike. I have to double check that my tool box is locked, and I have to double check that anything of value is locked inside of a locked chest, which is cable locked to the seat frame.

But all of this locking everything up, all of this worry about locking up everything that I own, trying to keep the tools and equipment that I use and need, it’s like a losing battle here in Dickinson. Living in Dickinson, it’s always, always one step forward, and two steps back.

Low-life, scum-of-the-earth thieves still roam the streets of downtown Dickinson at night trying to steal things out of people’s vehicles. They aren’t afraid of the Police, they aren’t afraid of going to jail, and they aren’t afraid of going to prison. The Police, the Judges, the jail, and prison aren’t bad enough or severe enough for them to be afraid, these things aren’t a deterrent to them.

I have to be careful about what I say, but I would like to kill the next person that I catch trying to steal something from me or vandalize something that I own. I know that I would probably get caught, that I would go to prison for years, maybe life, maybe get the death penalty. The thieves in Dickinson have no fear of getting caught, they will keep on stealing because their punishment is never severe enough, so I would just like to kill them right on the spot.

I called the Dickinson Police this morning, and an officer came and he looked at what I had going on. The Police Officer suggested to me that I get a trail camera. I went to Menards and I bought a high-definition security camera system for $190. I mounted the outdoor weatherproof high-definition security camera on my apartment balcony, aimed at where I park my vehicles.

The power and video cable from the outdoor camera go to a DVR inside my apartment that has a 1 terabyte hard drive. The default operation of the outdoor camera and DVR is to record video whenever motion is detected. However, I changed the settings so that the outdoor camera video is recorded continuously. There is enough memory for the camera video to be recorded continuously for eighty hours before the DVR automatically begins overwriting the older video.

Now, I sit here in my living room glancing at my television screen, which shows what is going on in the apartment building parking lot and out on the street. This afternoon, I went over to one of my neighbor’s house to tell him what had happened, and he and his wife told me that a luggage carrier had been stolen off of a truck one block away earlier this week.

The second neighbor that I spoke to this afternoon, he told me what else had been stolen this past week in this neighborhood. The third neighbor that I spoke to, he showed me the Nissan car that had been broken into last week. The first two neighbors that I spoke to this afternoon, they had an idea where the thieves are coming from, and this area is where I thought they were coming from too.

There is a very wretched and distressed apartment building, and several very distressed houses that have been subdivided into little cubby holes for the drug addicts to live in, that pretty much guarantee that we will always have crime in this neighborhood downtown. The drug addicts come out after midnight and wander around the neighborhood looking for things to steal.

Though these drug addicts wandering the streets at night in Dickinson attract the attention of the Police, what are the Police going to do besides asking them a few questions about what they are doing and where they are going? The way that Dickinson is now, probably 25% of the people living downtown have had a drug conviction in the past. With all these drug addicts walking the streets after midnight, each claiming that they are going somewhere, what are the Police going to do?

My Blog Posts About Crime In Dickinson, North Dakota Are Being Suppressed

I have been writing blog posts about Dickinson, North Dakota for over three years. I have never seen any of my blog posts deliberately pushed down in the Google search results more than my blog posts about crime in Dickinson, North Dakota.

When I have written articles about Real Estate in Dickinson, North Dakota, initially each of these articles appeared near the top of the Google search results for “Real Estate in Dickinson”. I then saw that each of these articles gradually got pushed down in the Google search results further and further over time. I knew the reason why.

There are about twenty to thirty real estate agents in Dickinson, who are always trying to get their name, their company name, or their listings near the top of the Google search results. They do this by personally doing a Google search for “Real Estate in Dickinson”, and then clicking their own website, again, and again, and again.

Likewise, when I have written articles about the Catholic Church in Dickinson that were highly critical, these articles initially appeared near the top of the Google search results. Later, I could sometimes see that actions were taken to try to hide these articles. Catholic Church members and volunteers, would perform a Google search for “Catholic Church in Dickinson” and then click on more favorable articles or websites, again, and again, and again.

In one instance, I think that an optimization company was hired by the Catholic Church or a church member to try to bury one of my blog posts about the Catholic Church. The reason why I think this, is because this article was at the top of the first page of Google search results for seven to eight months, and within the course of two days, this article was pushed back to page eight of Google search results.

I can understand why real estate agents in Dickinson want to get their name, their company name, or their listings at the top of the Google search results. I can understand why the Catholic Church or Catholics want to bury my blog posts that are critical of the Catholic Church. But who is it that is trying to hide my blog posts about crime in Dickinson? Who doesn’t want my blog posts about crime in Dickinson to be found and read?

I wrote my blog posts about crime in Dickinson, North Dakota, to let people know, to warn people, to alert people, to help people understand about the crime in Dickinson. Prior to this most recent oil boom that began in North Dakota in 2007, the crime in western North Dakota was much lower than most places in the United States. Beginning in about 2016, the crime in Dickinson became higher than many places in the United States.

Prior to the oil boom in 2007, in western North Dakota you could leave utility trailers unlocked, flat bed trailers unlocked, travel trailers unlocked, vehicles unlocked, tool boxes unlocked, houses unlocked, apartments unlocked, garages open, and leave keys in vehicles, and expect nothing to be taken. Now, it is the opposite, anything left out, open, or not locked down, you should expect it to be taken.

There are several reasons why the crime is so high in Dickinson now. The very experienced equipment operators, welders, mechanics, and skilled trades people who came to Dickinson during the oil boom, they left and went elsewhere when the oil boom ended. The very experienced and skilled trades people could get a job anywhere, they weren’t stuck in Dickinson, they could leave.

During the oil boom, there were many people who came to Dickinson who were not experienced workers or skilled trades people. Many of these people came to Dickinson because they kept hearing on television that, “Everyone was making over $100,000 per year in North Dakota”. These people did not have employment or good employment where they were living, they might have been involved in crime and drug activity where they were living, and they came to Dickinson with no money and with the expectation of making a lot of money in Dickinson, like they heard about on television.

When these financially broke, inexperienced, low-skilled, no-skilled people arrived in Dickinson, they found that they could not get a high paying job because they did not have a high school diploma, did not have a commercial driver’s license, had a criminal record, or had no work history. They could not get a high paying job, but they looked around and saw other people making money, people with $60,000 trucks, $20,000 Harley Davidsons, jet skis, four wheelers, side-by-side buggies. They saw people in Dickinson leaving their homes, apartments, vehicles, equipment, tools, and personal property unlocked.

The financially broke, inexperienced, low-skilled, no-skilled, no high school diploma, criminal record, no work history people remained in Dickinson and began stealing property and selling drugs. When the oil boom ended, they stayed in Dickinson, they had no where else to go.

Not only did North Dakota attract these inexperienced, low-skilled, no-skilled people during the oil boom, even to this day in 2018, careless, unthinking, irresponsible individuals in business, politics, and government continue to make announcements in high-unemployment, high-crime areas like Seattle and Spokane, that North Dakota has an over abundance of jobs, and shortage of workers.

It would be reasonable to advertise for commercial truck drivers, experienced welders, experienced mechanics, or experienced electricians if this is what occupations are in demand, but it is wrong to keep luring inexperienced, low-skilled, no-skilled people to North Dakota by stating that there are an abundance of jobs, when there are very few job openings for people who are not skilled tradespeople.

I don’t know why some North Dakotans in business, politics, and government keep trying to lure people to North Dakota from high-unemployment, high-crime areas. I don’t know if it is these same people who are trying to hide my blog posts about crime in Dickinson, or if it is members of law enforcement and politicians in Dickinson that don’t want the high amount of crime to be publicized.

The Criminality Of People In Dickinson, North Dakota

June 22, 2018Uncategorizedcrime in Dickinson North Dakota, criminals in Dickinson North Dakota, guide to Dickinson North Dakota, Information on Dickinson North Dakota, Living in Dickinson, North Dakota, Moving to Dickinson, North Dakota, relocating to Dickinson North Dakota, what is Dickinson North Dakota Like, would you move to Dickinson North Dakotaname withheld

Yesterday evening, I heard some noise outside in the parking lot of the apartment building where I live in downtown Dickinson, North Dakota. I looked out the window, and there was a City of Dickinson Police car, and a Stark County Sheriff truck. It appeared that they were looking for an apartment resident in order to take them into custody.

In the one year that I have lived at this apartment building in downtown Dickinson, I would say that the Police or Sheriff have been here about fifteen times. But that number would be too low, because the Police or Sheriff are here several times each month, and I am not even home half of the time, to witness the other times that they may have been here.

One of the frustrating things about living in Dickinson, North Dakota, is that the people here don’t even know that they are any different than people living elsewhere in the United States. The criminality of people here, far exceeds any place else that I have ever lived. I will give some examples.

The very first apartment building that I ever lived at, was in Gainesville, Florida. In the three years that I lived at this apartment building, where 50% of the residents were students, the Police might have shown up a total of two times.

The second apartment building that I ever lived at, was in Tampa, Florida. In the two years that I lived at this apartment building, the Police might have shown up a total of three times.

At this apartment building where I live in Dickinson, the Police have shown up an estimated forty times this past year. And, I wish that the Police would have shown up even more times than this, to handle the drug dealers, trespassers, suspicious acting people, reckless drivers, and other problems.

I began thinking about how to describe the criminality of people in Dickinson, North Dakota versus elsewhere. Below I will give my estimate of the number of adults with a criminal record in the other areas where I have lived.

Town where I grew up in Florida………….18% of adults with criminal record
Gainesville, Florida………………………….18% of adults with criminal record
Tampa, Florida……………………………….20% of adults with criminal record
Flagstaff, Arizona……………………………..15% of adults with criminal record
Eastern Idaho…………………………………20% of adults with criminal record
Fort Worth, Texas……………………………..20% of adults with criminal record
Dickinson, North Dakota……………………..35% of adults with criminal record

If Dickinson, North Dakota would not have had an oil boom………..20% of adults with criminal record, just like most other places.

The high number of criminal people living in Dickinson, North Dakota is due to the oil boom. The oil boom brought criminal people to Dickinson. For some people with a criminal record, the oil boom in North Dakota would allow them to get a job without their criminal record in a different state being discovered. For other people with a criminal record, it was primarily the rumor of high pay that brought them to Dickinson.

For some people with a criminal record, they moved to North Dakota with the expectation of either getting a high paying job, and if not, they would steal from the people with high paying jobs, or sell them illegal drugs.

The oil boom also turned some local people into criminals, after they were introduced to illegal drugs, they became a user, a dealer, or a thief in order to pay for their drug addiction.

At the oil field service companies and construction companies where I have worked in Dickinson, I would estimate that 40% to 45% of my male co-workers had a criminal record. In previous blog posts, I wrote about looking up the company managers and foremen of the companies where I worked in Dickinson, and most of them had criminal records for assault, drug possession, and DUI.

At the convenience stores, fast food restaurants, restaurants, and bars in Dickinson, I would estimate that 35% of the women employees have criminal records for drug possession, bad check writing, assault, or DUI.

Dickinson, North Dakota is not like other places in the United States. I have complained and written blog posts about the Police in Dickinson following people around, trying to come up with a reason to pull them over and question them. I was complaining that the Police were treating everyone like they were suspected of being a criminal. The truth is, that about one out of three people in Dickinson is a criminal, and they act like it.

One Of The Reasons Why There Is So Much Crime And Drug Dealing In Dickinson, North Dakota

May 21, 2018Uncategorizedcrime in Dickinson North Dakota, criminals moving to Dickinson North Dakota, drug dealers moving to Dickinson North Dakota, drug dealing in Dickinson North Dakota, guide to Dickinson North Dakota, Living in Dickinson, North Dakota, Moving to Dickinson, North Dakota, relocating to Dickinson North Dakota, why there is crime in Dickinson North Dakota, would you move to Dickinson North Dakotaname withheld

I had meant to write this blog post several days ago, after a reader from Seattle, Washington left a comment about her hearing on the radio that politicians in Dickinson were telling people to move to Dickinson, North Dakota.

When I read her comment, I said to myself, “I knew it! I knew it! There are idiots in Dickinson, who are announcing to the most crime infested areas like Seattle and Spokane, Washington…Come to Dickinson! Come to Dickinson!” This is why so many criminals and drug dealers from Washington state have been arriving in Dickinson this past year.

Here is her comment, I partly blocked out her user name, because she didn’t know that I was going to quote her:

Lily Onxxxxxx 3 days ago

Dickinson58601 Living In Dickinson North Dakota thanks for the honesty. I don’t recommend the Seattle area because of the crime rate. The city is rolling out the red carpet for the criminal homeless— recent rapes being committed by guys coming in from other states and living in tent camps. A woman was attacked in a rest room in a car dealership in what used to be a nice area. Another was attacked in a beach park that I used to go to frequently, I never was afraid there. I listened to radio from the Dickinson area and the politicians were eager to get families to settle there and build community—- alas

I checked out Dickinson to see if I could live and work there. Rent was too high.

Please read the above comments from Lily in Seattle, about the amount of crime in Seattle. Also, note that she heard on the radio that politicians in Dickinson want people to move to Dickinson, North Dakota. The problem is, this message is being heard in the highest crime, highest drug dealing, highest unemployment areas in the country.

What reminded me to write this blog post today, was that I was standing at my sliding glass door of my apartment balcony this morning, when some very trashy criminal looking people parked their beat up car in the parking lot and began walking into the apartment building. What do I mean by trashy criminal looking people, you may ask?

Professional people, trades people, and blue collar people who work, try to get where they are going with the least amount of trouble, problems, or conflict. Trashy people and criminals, act like they are looking for trouble, problems, or conflict wherever they go.

When I saw their Washington state license plate, it dawned on me who they were. The Stark County Sheriffs have been to my apartment building several times in the past ten days trying to serve these particular individuals court papers. Each of them has various charges to respond to, including threatening to shoot several people.

These people have been hiding from the Police for about ten days, and are driving a different vehicle in order to not be recognized. I wanted to call the Stark County Sheriff Department to let them know that they are here now, because I want these people out of the building where I live. But I didn’t call the Police and let them know, because I would expect these criminals from Washington state to cut my car tires and break my car windows in retaliation.

Are The Police Becoming Overwhelmed In Dickinson, North Dakota?

May 12, 2018Uncategorizedcrime in Dickinson North Dakota, drug dealing in Dickinson North Dakota, guide to Dickinson North Dakota, how to spot a drug dealer, Living in Dickinson, North Dakota, Moving to Dickinson, North Dakota, relocating to Dickinson North Dakotaname withheld

Today, Saturday May 12, I was at the car wash in Dickinson, North Dakota when one of my neighbors from down the street pulled in to the wash bay next to me. I said to him, that I lived at the apartment building down the street from him, and he acknowledged that he knew where I lived. I said to him, that we were having drug problems and crime at the apartment building where I live, and I had heard that there were problems down where he lived too, was that true, what was going on down there?

My neighbor said yes, they were having all kinds of problems. He has lived in the same house for the past seven years, and there never were very many problems until the past two years. He said that it was like everything changed recently. Because of the crime, he began trying to find someplace else to live, and soon he will be moving.

For instance he said, his neighbor next door moved out of the house which was a rental. He knows for sure that no one is supposed to be there in this vacant rental house, because he called and checked with the landlord after he spotted squatters and vagrants getting into this house at night and being inside this house at night. He telephoned the Dickinson Police the next time he saw that there were people trespassing inside this vacant rental house at night, and the Police told him that there was nothing they could do about it.

At the apartment building where I live, the drug dealer son of an apartment lessor is back in the apartment, and dealing drugs again, though he was kicked out about six months ago. Stark County Sheriff Deputies were here at the apartment building recently to serve residents court papers, and I hoped that they were here with eviction notices for the drug dealers. They weren’t, they were here for other residents. I heard from someone else other than the Sheriffs Deputies, that one of these residents had threatened to shoot several different people.

About ten days ago, I tried to buy and get financing for a $25,000 manufactured home in Belfield on its own 75 ft x 140 ft lot, because I don’t want to live around the crime and drug dealing in downtown Dickinson. My apartment neighbors on a different floor, where the Sheriff Deputies were serving court papers, they told me that they want to get out because they are scared that they are going to get shot.

I tried to reassure my neighbors that they were probably not going to get shot, and they said no we are serious, we really mean it, if you had heard what we have been hearing, you would realize that all kinds of things might happen. My neighbors said that they are trying to get approved for financing to buy a house. They have lived in this apartment building for a long time, and things have really gone down hill in the past couple of years they said.

After I wrote this blog post on Saturday night, and went to sleep, I was awoken at 2:00 a.m. by some woman screaming bloody murder. I looked out the window to see if some woman was getting attacked in the street, raped, robbed, or what was going on. I continued to hear a little bit of a disturbance, then another scream or yell, and some confused muttering. It turned out to be the woman in the drug dealing apartment in my building, who from her nonsense muttering, appeared to be out of her mind on drugs, and was not being hurt by anyone. This woman works in a fast food restaurant.

What I have noticed, and I have been writing about this on my blog website, is that most of the people that are arriving in Dickinson now, are not skilled trades people like experienced equipment operators, experienced welders, certified mechanics, plumbers, electricians, and oil field workers. Experienced trades people know how to check for job openings in an area, for the specific work that they do, before they pack up and relocate somewhere. They get a job before they relocate, and once they arrive in a new town for a new job, they go to work and don’t mess around getting into trouble.

In downtown Dickinson, and other places in Dickinson, I see new people arriving in town who don’t have jobs, and they begin getting into trouble right away. I will give several examples. About one month ago, two 20-23 year old boys moved into a subdivided rental house a couple of city blocks away from where I live, probably into the basement apartment. I saw both of them in my neighbor’s back yard where he keeps his motorcycles, four wheelers, tools, and equipment. I got my neighbor to come outside and check everything, and there were footprints in the snow going up to the back corner of his house, that he did not make.

Another example, the second day that the drug dealer had moved back into the apartment building where I live, a drug dealer supplier came driving up to the apartment in an inner city ghetto modified SUV, playing ghetto music, acting all proud and belligerent, like this is Oakland or something. People who work for a living, don’t act like drug dealers, or come and deliver drugs during the middle of the day.

In the neighborhood where I live, there have been several reckless driving accidents, and there are always near miss accidents from people failing to stop for stop signs, or failing to realize that cross streets do not have stop signs. All of the trades people in my neighborhood, whether they drive a new truck or an old truck, they always yield to cars on the cross streets, even when there are no stop signs, in order to prevent an accident.

If you work in the oil field, or for any skilled trade profession, it is very, very important that you do not have any vehicle accidents on your record, so that you can drive company vehicles, it’s part of your job. All of the skilled working people in the neighborhood where I live, are very careful driving. However, as an example, there was recently a new arrival in Dickinson, who I am told works at McDonalds, who was driving so fast on the 25 mph street, that he lost control of his vehicle, jumped the curb, crossed the grass strip, and took out about 100 ft of chain link fence.

The reckless driving vehicle accidents, the drug dealing, the theft, and the crime in Dickinson that has been on the rise in the past two years, is caused by the low-skilled no-skilled people who are arriving in Dickinson now. There are so many people like this moving to Dickinson now, that it sometimes seems like the Police are not able to keep up with all of the trouble that they cause.

Important Note For Police And Everyone: If you have a young male, let’s say age 17 years to age 27 years old, he does not have a job, and he does not work, and people, black people, white people, men, and women, need to come and see him in the morning, the afternoon, the evening, and late at night, for maybe five minutes, fifteen minutes, sometimes sitting in their cars on the street or in the parking lot waiting for him, what do you think is going on? Is he just popular, and sought after for advice, this unemployed young man?

Here’s another hint, what if there are people who come to see him, who are later walking, standing, sitting inside the building or in the parking lot in a stupor? I don’t know why it is so hard to spot a drug dealer.

Unless the Dickinson Police drug dog can read prescription medication labels for oxycontin, hydrocodone, codeine, fentynal, xanax, or adderall, determine who is being prescribed this medication, count pills, and ask where this medication is going, this might be a reason why the Police drug dog never detects illegal drugs in and around this apartment. It might not be methamphetamine, crack cocaine, or heroin.

Because the mom, sons, and grandkid, all act like they have something wrong with them and are on medication, they may all have medical prescriptions for xanax or adderall. A xanax prescription would explain why the son and the son’s visitors are seen walking, standing, or sitting in a zombie like stupor.

Drug Dealing And Crime At My Apartment Building In Downtown Dickinson Almost Causing Me To Move

May 3, 2018Uncategorizedcrime in Dickinson North Dakota, crime in downtown Dickinson North Dakota, drug crime in Dickinson North Dakota, drug dealing in Dickinson North Dakota, guide to Dickinson North Dakota, Information on Dickinson North Dakota, Living in Dickinson, North Dakota, Moving to Dickinson, North Dakota, relocating to Dickinson North Dakota, renting in downtown Dickinson North Dakota, what is Dickinson North Dakotaname withheld

About one year ago, I moved into an older apartment building in downtown Dickinson, North Dakota. For 3-1/2 years prior to this, while I was working in Dickinson, I paid rent to a homeowner on the north side of Dickinson to stay in his 3 bedroom, 2 bathroom home. For the past eight years, I have owned a 3 bedroom, 2 bathroom home in Idaho, where I have spent very little time due to working in North Dakota, Utah, and Texas.

The 3br/2ba home on the north side of Dickinson where I lived for 3-1/2 years, was very similar to living in my 3br/2ba home in Idaho. All of the neighbors in the rural area on the north side of Dickinson believed, and behaved the same way.

All of the neighbors in the rural area on the north side of Dickinson had extra trucks, trailers, equipment, motorcycles, four wheelers, boats, and garages where they worked on all of the things that they owned. They took care of their property, were quiet, didn’t play loud music, didn’t drive recklessly or carelessly, and stayed on their own property.

All of the neighbors in the rural area quickly spotted any vehicle that was unfamiliar to them, and watched the vehicle to see where it was going and what they were going to do. Most of the neighbors had a couple of outdoor dogs, that would start barking whenever someone unfamiliar was anywhere near their yard or the neighbor’s yard, which caused people to look outside or come outside to see what the dogs were barking at.

In the 3-1/2 years of living in the rural area on the north side of Dickinson, no one had any theft or trespassers. We had a medium sized bird dog that was very alert, and every neighbor surrounding us had medium sized to large outdoor hunting dogs that guarded the houses. One of the neighbors had huskies and malamutes that never came inside.

Due to the home owner where I was staying being older and having health problems, which caused among other things, him to come into the living room and turn on the television and make a lot of noise during the late night and early a.m. hours, which woke me up and prevented me from falling back to sleep, I wanted to go and live some place else. The oil boom was over in North Dakota by the end of 2015, and rents all throughout Dickinson had decreased through 2016 and 2017.

I did not want to spend very much money for rent in Dickinson. I was just here to work, to try to make as much money as possible, to try to save as much money as possible, to try to spend as little as possible, so that one day I could return to my home in Idaho, and resume a normal life.

Just as an aside, to answer the question, What do I mean by resuming a normal life? For instance, in the area of Idaho where I had lived, there was an equal number of men and women. Perhaps even a slightly higher number of women. It was common for women in Idaho to want to make a good impression, to try to have a nice appearance, to be polite, and to try to be friendly and helpful. Why? Because they wanted to make friends, make acquaintances, have the chance for more opportunities, to advance professionally, to be asked out on dates, or to be invited to go places.

But let me get back to Dickinson. In the Spring of 2017, I sought to find an inexpensive apartment in Dickinson. The older apartment buildings downtown, had significantly lower rent than the newly constructed apartment buildings on the outer perimeter of Dickinson. At one of the older apartment buildings downtown, which was probably at 50% occupancy, the apartment manager gave me a very good deal on a two bedroom apartment, because I had very good credit, two jobs, had already been working in Dickinson for four years, and I did not have any criminal record.

I liked the 2 bedroom apartment very much, it had a nice view, and it did not cost very much. I was glad to have privacy, and quiet at night when I was sleeping, which I had not had while I was living with a homeowner on the north side of Dickinson. I also liked the convenience of living downtown, it was a shorter drive to places like the grocery store.

Within a couple of months of moving into an apartment in downtown Dickinson, several bad things began happening at about the same time. In order to not be a jerk, or start any problems with my apartment neighbors, I did not want to take any person’s parking space. So I parked my vehicles on the street. I had to look all over town, but I found a business owner who was willing to rent to me a spot to park one of my trucks, about four blocks away from where I lived downtown.

When I had traveled all over the United States for work, to Colorado, Arizona, Utah, Idaho, Texas, and North Dakota, I kept a large locked trunk, chained and locked to the back seat frame, inside of my truck. In this trunk, I kept my birth certificate, social security card, $500 emergency money, and a large 11″x17″ portfolio binder showing years and years of my engineering work. After 15 years of travelling like this, working in places like Pueblo, Phoenix, Laredo, and Fort Worth, I thought that this locked and chained down trunk inside of my locked truck was safe enough in Dickinson.

I was wrong. My entire truck was stolen in downtown Dickinson. I handed out flyers all over southwest North Dakota, and after a week, different people telephoned me to tell me who had my stolen truck. I was able to contact associates and relatives of the person who stole my truck, who was already wanted by the Police in Dickinson for his seventh and eighth felonies. Due to pressure from friends, relatives, and the Police, my truck was left abandoned beside Hwy 85.

Missing from my stolen truck was about $1,500 to $2,000 in tools and equipment. The electric trailer brake controller, radar detector, two spare truck tires, spare trailer tire, truck bed tool box, floor jack, air tank, tool sets, carrier rack, and the four good tires that were on it, had all been removed and sold. The $500 cash went in his pocket, and my birth certificate, social security card, portfolio of work, business cards, owners manual with service history and receipts, all went in the garbage somewhere, probably.

At about the same time that my truck was stolen in downtown Dickinson, I was having problems at my apartment building in downtown Dickinson. The source of many of these problems, were two apartments in my building where drugs were being used and sold.

Shortly after moving into this building, several residents and myself, witnessed the Police trying to escort a resident from one of the drug apartments to their Police car. This young lady repeatedly tried to injure herself by intentionally banging her head against the brick walls, doors, Police car, and inside the Police car. She was obviously out of her mind on drugs.

At all hours of the day and night, people would come and go from these two drug apartments in the downtown apartment building where I lived. Or, sometimes people would stay and get high, then sit or wander in the apartment building common areas in a zombie like stupor.

After I had lived in this downtown apartment building for about six weeks, I telephoned the apartment building management, and I told them that they had a drug problem in this building. People coming and going from two apartments throughout the day and night, people sitting in a stupor on balconies, walking the hallway stoned in the early a.m. hours. The building management asked me to specify which two apartments. When I was reluctant to do so, the building management asked if it was apartment xx and xx, and I said yes, exactly. Since other residents of the building had already complained and had identified the two apartments, I gave some additional information.

It turned out, that the main drug dealing apartment was not even supposed to be occupied by the people who were living there. A mother of an adult son, she had rented the apartment, then she went off to live someplace else, and she left her adult son in the apartment. This adult son who did not have a job, he invited other people who did not have jobs, to come and stay with him at the apartment where he wasn’t even on the lease. This group of unemployed people, none of them were on the apartment lease, bought and sold drugs all day, and used drugs all day.

The apartment building managers and the Police, made an attempt to clear the apartment building of all drug activity, which helped some, but there was a recurrence of problems. This sector of downtown Dickinson, had more than several drug houses and drug apartments. People would continue to come to this apartment building, or wander around this immediate area, seeking drugs. People who were not in their right minds, would either come straight to this building or eventually wander over to this building, and they would try to hang out here, hoping or thinking that a drug dealer or someone with drugs would turn up any minute, because they had got drugs here in the past.

This led to things like me finding someone who was not a resident of the building, almost completely passed out and unable to move, laying in the stairwell of this building at 3:00 a.m. Finding someone who was not a resident of the building, sitting in their car hiding behind the garages, acting out of their mind on drugs. Finding someone who was not a resident of the building, shuffling around and acting crazy in the parking lot around the vehicles at 2:00 a.m. And the combination of people who do not live here loitering or wandering through the property 24 hours per day, while at the same time residents find that someone has removed property from their car or tampered with their car.

In this past month, I found a couple of 20-23 year olds that didn’t belong in my neighbor’s backyard where he keeps his equipment, motorcycles, and four wheelers; a non-resident with a station wagon filled with garbage bags trying to fill up our one apartment building garbage container; a couple of drug impaired non-residents searching through our apartment building garbage container with flashlights for about 20 minutes, who were probably looking for bank statements and credit card bills. And finally, the drug dealer, drug user adult son who does not have a job, is back at his mother’s apartment dealing drugs.

The apartment building management, and the Police, had tried to rid this apartment building of the drug dealing about eight months ago, by confronting the drug dealers, seeing if any drugs could be detected or found, and threatening the lease holders of the two suspected apartments with eviction. Months and months later, people were still coming onto this apartment building property 24 hours per day hoping to find drugs, because they had gotten drugs here in the past.

Within one day of the drug dealer with no job being back on the apartment building property, I watched black guys from out of state with inner city ghetto vehicles driving right up to this apartment like it’s a drive through or convenience store for drugs.

(If you want to see what an out of state, inner city ghetto vehicle used by drug dealers looks like, go peak through the fence of the impound lot at East End Towing in Dickinson to see the Range Rover which has been lowered with custom wheels, California license plates, with the windows broken out of it, and beat all to hell from misuse and abuse.)

I thought about calling the apartment building management, or going and talking to them in person, and saying to them that they have got to get rid of the people in this apartment, evict the lease holder once and for all. I think that it would have probably turned into an argument, with me threatening to leave, or the apartment management suggesting that I leave, because they are tired of hearing about it.

I think that there is so much crime in downtown Dickinson now, there are so many low income and inner city ghetto people that have moved to Dickinson recently, that the property managers and the Police are overwhelmed, they don’t know what to do, or how to handle it.

I asked the homeowner where I used to live in Dickinson, if I could come back and live with him in an emergency, because I can foresee getting into an argument with the property management, where they will ask me to leave. He is partly sympathetic, because he knows that my truck and all of the property in my truck would never had gotten stolen if he would have allowed me to keep my truck parked at his house.

When I think about renting an apartment elsewhere in Dickinson, what I am certain of, is that I sure as hell am not going to pay more money to live in a newer apartment building in Dickinson, and still be around apartments where people sell and use drugs. The new apartment buildings are at 50% occupancy, they will rent to anyone, and there are so many lower income and inner city ghetto people that have recently moved to Dickinson, that I don’t see how I can ever escape the crime and drug dealing in Dickinson by renting any apartment in Dickinson.

Note: I want to explain why I associate all of this crime in Dickinson with low income people and inner city ghetto people who have recently moved to Dickinson.

People who spent a lot of time and money to obtain a college degree, or worked their way up to management level, or professional level, or have enough demonstratable skill and experience to have a good paying job, these people all know better than to jeopardize all of their hard work by attempting to steal things out of people’s vehicles, garages, and homes. To get caught with a stolen vehicle, trailer, or equipment. Also, they are usually capable of buying the things that they want, rather than taking the foolish and unnecessary risk of stealing things.

It is mostly low income and inner city ghetto people that look at the risk of being caught, convicted, and sentenced for trying to steal a phone or laptop out of a vehicle, or valuables out of someone’s home, as being worth the risk. The risk of them spending 30 days in jail, or one year in prison, is worth the $200 to $400 they might receive from stealing something from someone’s vehicle or burglarizing a home.

More Hoodlum Behavior In Downtown Dickinson, North Dakota

April 22, 2018Uncategorizedapartments in Dickinson North Dakota, crime in Dickinson North Dakota, criminal mischief in Dickinson North Dakota, downtown neighborhoods in Dickinson North Dakota, guide to Dickinson North Dakota, Information on Dickinson North Dakota, Living in Dickinson, North Dakota, Moving to Dickinson, North Dakota, relocating to Dickinson North Dakota, trespassing in Dickinson North Dakotaname withheld

Almost one year ago, I moved from a house in a rural area on the north side of Dickinson, to an apartment in downtown Dickinson. I went from an area where nothing illegal or criminal ever happened, to where criminal activity is taking place all of the time, every day.

In the almost one year that I have lived in downtown Dickinson, I have seem drug dealing and drug use in the apartments where I live, the police coming and taking people away in handcuffs who are acting insane, vehicles having things stolen out of them, my truck got stolen, drunk or high people crashing through the fence into the canal in their vehicle three times, passed out drunk or high non-residents in the apartment stairwell, non-residents hiding, sneaking, and up to no good on the property several times. This probably doesn’t even cover everything, and this has been in less than one year.

There are some very nice, tidy, well kept yards and homes in downtown Dickinson that are owned by older retired people, blue collar trades people, business owners, and professional people. However, there are also some single family homes that have been divided into two or three rental units, and apartment buildings.

In the past, urban planners and property developers probably included apartment buildings in downtown Dickinson in order to fill a need, and in order to balance things out. There were some residents in Dickinson who did not earn enough money to buy a home, some of them young, some of them old, some of them just starting out, some of them retired, or families that were just getting started.

In Dickinson in the past, there was not much of a need or desire to separate lower income people from higher income people. In the past, people generally tried to behave and get along, whether they were upper class or lower class, because there were immediate consequences for anyone behaving badly for too long. In the past, people in Dickinson just did not persist in being disruptive to everyone, it just wasn’t allowed.

Now in downtown Dickinson, the rental houses that have been divided into several units, and the older apartment buildings, have unfortunately become a habitat for poor people who often have a combination of multiple personal problems which include unemployment, illegal drug use, drug dealing, alcoholism, mental illness, theft, burglary, robbery, assault, vandalism, and other criminal behavior.

I began this blog post by writing that in downtown Dickinson where I live, there is crime every day, all day long. About a month ago, I woke up at 2:00 a.m. and I looked out of my apartment window, there was a strange acting non-resident, who was shuffling around with tiny steps, going back and forth, back and forth repeatedly beside people’s vehicles in the parking lot.

I couldn’t tell what this person was trying to do or why they were behaving like this. I could tell that it was an older man, and I didn’t know if he had Alzheimers disease, dementia, or if he was under the influence of drugs. I watched him for several minutes, and then it appeared that although he was acting like he had something wrong with him, he was also looking to see what was in the front seat and the back seat of vehicles.

I telephoned the Dickinson Police, but by the time that the Police arrived, this man had wandered away. I gave a description to the Police, but they didn’t find him. When I had to leave for work at about 4:00 a.m., I was able to drive along following this man’s footprints in the snow, to the apartment where he lived a couple of blocks away.

When I got home that night, I asked my neighbors who live in the house next door, if they knew who this was. They said yes, they knew who this was, yesterday he had let himself into their back yard through their fence gate, and he went and urinated in their back yard behind a tree, he was drunk yesterday. The neighbor said that if her brother catches him, he is going to beat him. This is just an example of what happens throughout the day here.

What caused me to write this blog post today, is what happened today, Sunday, at 11:30 a.m. I walked out to my vehicle to go to the grocery story, and I started my vehicle. As I was sitting in my vehicle, a gold color station wagon drove past the apartment building where I live going very slowly. When I drove down the street, and turned the corner, this gold color station wagon had stopped, people got out, and began loading multiple garbage bags into another apartment building’s trash container.

I thought that this was a shitty, sleazy thing to do. In this gold color station wagon, I could see that they had bags and bags of garbage in their car, and that they were going to fill up this apartment building’s garbage container, and they don’t even live there.

I drove back around the city block, because I thought that these people were going to attempt to do this same thing at the apartment building where I live. Sure enough, there they were trying to load the garbage container at the building where I live, with the garbage bags from their vehicle. I drove up to them and I laid on the car horn, I told them that they can’t fill up our garbage container with their garbage from their car. I told them I was going to call the Police, to have a talk with them, and I drove away.

There are about twenty to twenty-five residents at the apartment building where I live. Myself, and other residents, sometimes have to wait for the garbage container to get emptied before we can take out our garbage from our apartments. Sometimes, someone who does not live here, drives up and fills up our garbage container. The garbage container is about 200 gallons in size, it is just barely adequate for this apartment building, it is not a dumpster.

I telephoned the Dickinson Police non-emergency dispatch number, and the Police dispatcher who was new, said that it was not illegal for someone to do this. This made me very angry, and I explained to the dispatcher that this is something that the tenants pay for, this is something that the apartment building owner pays for, yes it is illegal for people who do not live here, to fill up our garbage container with bags and bags of their garbage, so that the residents who live here can’t even use it.

The Police dispatcher agreed to have a Police Officer call me, I had the vehicle license plate number,make, and model. This made me even angrier, besides me catching the person who was probably the one responsible for causing our garbage container to always be full so that the apartment residents can’t even use it, the Police were possibly going to say that there was nothing that they could do about this.

Herein lies a problem which I have noticed for the past year. If you live in house, and there is someone walking around on your property, hiding behind a garage on your property, parked in a car on your property, passed out on your property, or acting strange around your vehicles on your property at 2:00 a.m., the Police would respond to a call about this with the understanding that this was trespassing or criminal mischief. However, when this same thing happens at an apartment where there are about twenty to twenty-five residents, even if you explain to the Police that this person that you called them about does not live here, the Police somewhat act like you have less of a right to complain, and the other person who is not a resident of the premises, has somewhat of right to be there. The Police Officers, are somewhat more in agreement with the caller’s complaint, than the Police dispatcher sometimes.

In other words, if you live in an apartment building in Dickinson, even though it is privately owned property, which you pay rent to live in, the Police and other people, kind of have the impression that it is a public parking lot, a public garbage container, a public hallway, or a public stairwell.

I believe that this is one of the sources of the criminal problems in downtown Dickinson. Because of these private apartment building properties, being looked at by the Police and other people, as public places, you get this 24 hour, 7 days a week, people wandering through, looking for the opportunity to sell illegal drugs, buy illegal drugs, steal from cars, commit burglary, commit robbery, commit vandalism, or hang out waiting for opportunities to commit crimes.

I wish that the Police in Dickinson, and the residents in downtown Dickinson, would begin to see and re-consider, that the permissive attitude of allowing people to roam around and wander through private property and private property that has a common area, that this is allowing and creating the opportunity for crime to happen.