0 comments/ 5726 views/ 0 favorites Seeing the Police By: ellynei The following is as authentic as anything based on memory can be. At least when my memory is the memory in question. It was originally written in my native language, Danish, in an attempt of mine to get past the experiences it covers and move on with my life. It has been edited for typos, and translated to English, but has since its creation neither been streamlined, nor beautified, nor dramatised for the sake of any audience. The following text contains the truth, as confusing and raw as I saw it at the time of writing it down. * I walked out from the police-station. There I fished my cell-phone out of my bag. My red and white, plastic bag. In spite of my gender I have never owned a ladies purse. The sun shone, I think. Yes, it must have; I didn't like the weather. Sunshine makes my eyes hurt and reminds me that summers can be warm. Too warm. Since I got fat, I haven't been able to stand the heat. (Why did I ever agree to try Zyprexa?) There was a crackling, empty feeling. What had just happened? I had gone to see the police to report a crime. That's what you are supposed to do when you have been exposed to one. Isn't it? Is it? Not? Before taking a cab to town, I thought that was what one was meant to do. Was I wrong? There had to be something I had misunderstood. But what? On the inside I was shaking, but my hands looked steady and my lips weren't trembling. The cab soon arrived. My voice didn't shake when I spoke my address. I couldn't remember what the policeman looked like or what his name was. For a merciful moment, I couldn't remember a word he had said either. When he let me out of the interrogation room, I couldn't remember the way out. I couldn't recognise neither corridor nor staircase. That happens to me when I've been exposed to something unpleasant. Memory-loss. I also get confused and have difficulty thinking straight. Is it like that for everyone? An interrogation room. I'd never before been in an interrogation room. I was only able to recognise it as that because I once saw an episode of Station 2 where a police officer interrogated a suspect in a room of similar design. In that episode of Station 2, the seated suspect --with the blurred face-- sat and alternately smoked and balanced his cigarette on the police officer's table. (There was no ash-tray.) The police officer was questioning the suspect about some crime. The suspect alternated between replying and asking if he had now been caught enough times to spend some time on the inside. I tried to push the association aside. It wasn't easy. The first thing the policeman said was something like: "You sit there and stay there." While delivering the message, he pointed at the chair which you place the suspect in. Already then I was completely rattled. I had, by a policeman, been ordered to sit in a chair by a wall in an interrogation room. What if I should momentarily forget and stand up? Would it only be extremely embarrassing, or would it also be illegal? Civil disobedience or whatever the term is called. I was afraid to sit down. I wanted to go home and hide. But, seriously, to a) have gone all the way to the police-station, b) have pulled a number (and waited), c) have explained what crime one had been exposed to (and waited), and d) finally have been taken in to give a statement. Damn, it would be embarrassing to weepishly ask permission to go home the very moment one arrived at the interrogation chamber. It's not that I had time to think about all that in the situation. The police-dude had said "sit" and, even though the screams of my instincts made me hesitate, I didn't consider not "sitting". In a desperate attempt to act natural and obliging I seated forward on the chair. Too forward. Only half my ass touched the seat. The next few minutes, I can't clearly remember. I remember using most of my concentration on figuring out whether I should carefully raise my butt from the seat to push myself all the way onto the chair. Or if I should remain as I were. I kept pretending I was unaware that the manner in which I sat was utterly ridiculous, and kept pretending that this thing with being placed in the suspect's seat was natural. It isn't natural. The design of an interrogation room ensures the policeman an architectonic advantage in case of a sudden fight. But, the design also places the subject in a psychologically subdued position. The policeman has a comfortable chair (at least it looks comfortable from where the suspect sits). The policeman has a table which from the suspect's point of view hides half the policeman's body. Suspect has no table. The suspect's back is against the wall, but the suspect's front is bared and unprotected. It is a powerful psychological inequality. Add to this that the policeman is an authority figure, an authority, the impression magnifies. The humiliating effect of the interrogation room is variable. The suspect's chair can be moved closer to the policeperson's table. If the chair is moved all the way to the table the suspect still can't see what the police-person's monitor displays, but a psychological equality between the two arises. The legs of both are partially hidden by the table and the physical distance between the two persons are now appropriate for conversation. It is actually quite brilliant in its simplicity. When the chair is far from the table, the suspect, whether she wants to or not, will be placed in a subdued position and will feel pressured. When the chair is close to the table, the suspect has a chance to relax. When I was questioned, my chair (the suspect's place) was at the wall and I wasn't given permission to move it to the table. On the contrary I was told to stay and not move. Why!?! What did I do? I went in there to report a crime and then I am being treated as a dangerous criminal. Why? The memory torments me. To sit there, helplessly trapped on a chair. To remember how I pathetically sat far forward on the chair in a pitiful attempt to maintain just a shred of my dignity. I hate myself when I think about it. It was so undignified and embarrassing. Some place inside, I can't help but believe it was my own fault. I had to have done something, right? The police doesn't do stuff like that to people for no reason. Do they? In the cab on my way home I said something lame to the driver about being treated badly when reporting a crime. I can't remember exactly what I said. I couldn't think clearly. Aftershock. I knew I was looking forward to some bad days. I knew that already before leaving home. That is the price I am accustomed to paying for doing an errand in town. That's the main reason I spend a fortune on cabs getting in there and home. The 400 crowns spent on cab fares spares me a day or two in hell. (Well, that's the math I've come to by comparing downtime following errands where I go by bus, to errands where I go by cab.) Aftershock. As usual, it fairly much kept itself in check till I got home. I paced back and forth in our living room. It was worse than it usually is, much worse. It smouldered and pounded and hurt in my stomach. I couldn't keep my hands still. They constantly fisted and opened and I remembered. I began to remember. Things he had said. Things I had said. "I don't have a particularly good memory," I had said. "No," he had said with a grimace and thereby mockingly agreed. When I'm having a down time I try to handle it myself, but I couldn't handle this. I woke my boyfriend and clung to him while weeping hysterically. I still can't remember the policeman's name or face, but small memory-glimpses from the interrogation haunts me. I remember that at one point he started talking a lot. Like really blah blah blah, as if he was trying to tell me something. With my ears open and my mouth shut, I sat and stared at him trying to make sense of his words. It was impossible. After a while, I interrupted him and said it, as it is, that I am schizotypal and that I am unable to catch on to allusions. I explained that if he wanted to tell me something then he would have to tell me directly. I remember, he seemed to have a hard time saying it directly. Sort of testingly he started out with: "It's stupid." I think I interrupted him at that. Otherwise I did after a second sentence synonymous with "It's stupid." Either way, I, in my confused condition, said something like, "Yes, it was stupid. Of course it was stupid. It is stupid to let people into your home. It's stupid to trust anyone." Then the police-dude started explaining that the thing that was stupid, was to leave wallet and credit-card in plain sight. Although I didn't understand why he was wasting our time talking about stuff like that, I explained that my boyfriend and I don't own a safe. The police-dude didn't quite think a safe was needed. But, what he actually wanted to say was that... Yes, he did hesitate the closer he got to his point, but in the end it came out. "When you leave wallet and credit-card out in the open and let young people come into your home, then, you might say, it is your own fault." That was about the words, not exact, though. Memory is rarely exact, especially not mine. I sat there and looked at him. What was I supposed to say to that? Anyone can figure out that guests, young or old, can find opportunity to steal. In my opinion only the fewest imagine that a guest sneakily will find a chance to write down your credit-card-information while you are at the toilet to then swindle for thousands of crowns via the internet. I didn't say any of this. Actually, I couldn't see the point of talking about the crime having been avoidable. He wasn't presenting advice of crime prevention. He just said it was my own fault. He didn't say what I should have done differently. While I wondered what the point was, I started blabbering. But, of course, it was stupid, I should have acquired something suitable to lock stuff away in, and, of course, I would be more careful in the future. In the back of my head, I was wondering why I was apologising for having been hustled. In the back of my head I wondered, even more, why the police-dude was wasting so much of his valuable time on telling the victim that it was her own fault. With the wisdom of hindsight: Is a crime less of a crime, when it can only be committed if the victim displays trust to the criminal? If it is my fault, should I be accused as accomplice to fraud? After I discovered what that kid had done, the majority of the financial loss of the fraud was transferred to the companies at which he had spent the money. While I was left with American company numbers on my phone-bill (from contacting the firms); unanswered questions on whether that kid's fraud has affected my credit-value on the internet; cab-expenses; and a really rotten feeling of being a victim. So far, it is far easier for me to get past the crime I was exposed to by the 16-year old acquaintance than it is to get past the treatment the police-dude exposed me to. Was I being punished for reporting a crime? Or did I do something else wrong? Sometimes I think he was nagging on me to get me to pull back the report. Or to, in general, make sure that I'd never again waste the police's time with insignificant matters. I don't get it, it can't be right. Am I again being naive? What is it I don't see? It's been more than two weeks and my stomach still hurts when I think of the police-dude. I am not capable of simply not thinking about him. There is so much I don't get, that is a large part of how come I am sick. I am afraid of people because things very often goes badly between me and others. People easily get pissed at me without me having any clue what I did wrong. It's not that I think I don't do anything wrong. I am 32 years old, over the years a few have gotten their acts together to give me some hints as to what I do wrong. For example I have an incredibly arrogant manner, a bit like, "Yes, I've got a brain and I'm not afraid to use it. But how did I manage to piss the police-dude off on the short walk from entrance to interrogation room? Small glimpses torment me. "Now you are muddling up your story," he said, or something like that. "That wasn't how you described it before." That made me angry. Because just before he said that, I had been rambling about the day the 16-year old most likely snatched my credit-card information. And that, I had not previously described. I hadn't had an opportunity to. There wasn't really any reason to be rambling about it though. A priori, (as you say if you think you are too clever to say "In advance",) I thought the police needed to know that the kid had had opportunity to snatch the information and that he hadn't had opportunity to use it from me and my boyfriend's shared apartment. The reason I was rambling was that mentally I was running on my last vestiges, and the torture-master didn't quite control the conversation. When I discovered that my credit-card information had been abused, I first called the bank and had the card locked, then called the police to find out how one reports a crime. By phone I came through to a guy who said I could report through the internet or by going to the police-station (or is that one called the police headquarters?) during the daytime. But that I shouldn't expect that the matter would be investigated, that the police doesn't investigate all these cases, mostly only investigate the big cases. Small glimpses torment me. "I don't investigate cases unless I have a full name," he said. Something like that anyway. "I didn't know that," I said, or something like that, while wondering why we were talking about this. I merely came to report a crime and offer the information I happened to have about it. Why was he wasting his precious time alternately scolding me and debating strange matters? They don't have time to solve cases, but they have time to yack away about their routines? No, that can't be right. There is something I have misunderstood. So. I go to the police station to report a crime. I mean, a schizotypal woman and a police officer go into an interrogation room... I am a walking, talking joke. A loser who, in spite of a functional body, lacks the strength to earn her own living. I'm so fucked up that it's been impossible for me to find people to be fucked up with. Well, my boyfriend can stand me. Apart from each other, we are incredibly lonely. My best friend lives in England. The English friend, my mother, and my boyfriend, are the only adult people who are interested in talking to me without getting paid in some way. There are some kids who, more or less regularly, come to us to play computer games. They don't come to be with us, they just like computer games, same as we do. Sometimes I fear what people think of us. It is, after all, quite Michael Jackson-like. It is. It isn't normal. Once, I gave in to my fear of people. Well, I was broken by it. Or maybe I was just incapable of telling the difference between the two concepts. I spent more than a year isolated in a one-room-apartment. I got worse every week. It's a long boring story, so I will skip directly to my point: Complete isolation is bad for you, even if you suffer from various phobias. Noisy kids are better company than no company. Even though they make my ears hurt, they can actually be very sweet and funny. When they want to. Small glimpses. "Do they sometimes spend the night, these children?" That was just about the wording of the police-dude's question. "Yes," was my reply. "The little ones who live close-by sometimes do." In the mean while, I wondered what that had to do with the matter at hand. I had already explained that the credit-card-abuse couldn't have taken place from my home. Did he think I was a pedophile? If he thought I were a pedophile, why didn't he ask for name and address of as many kids as possible? I didn't know surname and address of the 16-year old, whom I am convinced is behind the credit-card-fraud. I did have his step-father's telephone number, though. Why the long hard interrogation? There was no organisation in the questioning. No. If there had been the slightest suspicion that I were pedophile, it would have been a good idea to take the case seriously. By investigating the matter of credit-card fraud, the police-dude would be able to inconspicuously contact every kid who had ever visited us. No. He probably didn't think such a thing. But then why the psychological torture? Why was I put in that torture chamber, eh - i mean, interrogation room? Why didn't they just take my information at the front desk and let me go home? Before I went to the police station, I believed there was such a thing as civic duty. It is a noun. As far as I knew/believed it covered the concept of things considered duty for any ordinary, law-abiding, citizen. I thought that when you knew of a crime, then it was your duty to report it to the police. In spite of this understanding (or is it a delusion?) I have never previously been to the police to report a crime. I've been there to have my passport made, back when the police did that. I've also once spent a night in the detention (if that's what it's called) the place they put drunk people. At that time, I had spent more than a year in isolation, my younger brother had recently deceased, and I was either hysterical or in the middle of a psychosis. (Psychiatric ER would have nothing to do with me. They claimed I wasn't insane.) Anyhow, passport-renewal, some years back, and a night in the drunk-box, also some years back, that was the extent of my familiarity with the police. So why did he start out so aggressively? Sit. Stay. I can't have done anything in advance. Can I? I wasn't the one to ask to be sent on from the front desk. How in the world did I manage to make him so hateful in advance? Glimpses. I had explained that the 16-year old was one of those who steadily came and played computer games in our home, except the 16-year old didn't come very often. But out of those who had come by this summer, he was the only one whom I could imagine had done it. "So, that social-phobia doesn't apply in your home," concluded the police-dude, just about with those words. Very close to it anyhow. I'm not sure exactly what I replied. I know that I, at that point, was too rattled to compare visiting a café to letting people into your home. About a week after i went to the police, there was a letter from Fyns Politi in my mailbox. I quickly skimmed it, blah blah, have decided not to investigate, blah blah, 4 weeks window of opportunity to complain. I was actually relieved to get a letter, because, honestly, the way he had been harassing me in the interrogation room, apparently to make me drop the charges, I had started to suspect that he would shelve the case by claiming I had withdrawn the report during the interrogation. He didn't ask many questions related to the case during that interrogation. Actually, he used more time saying things than on asking questions. "Really. What is this? What kind of amounts are these to present?" From my net-banking, I had copied every single of the 17 withdrawals from my visa-dankort which the swindler had made. I had printed them out and brought with me. "Five crowns," spurted the police-dude, and then he said something like, "What kind of petty-amounts is that to present." Where was he headed with that? I didn't ask. I merely said, as it was, that I had included every single amount. There had been 17 withdrawals which I hadn't made. They varied in size from 5 crowns to 1305 crowns. All in all for more than 3000 crowns. If the matter was going to be investigated, then each amount would tell that on this and this date, at exactly this and this time, the credit-card information was unrightfully used from that and that IP-address. Seeing the Police If you have a warrant, an IP-address becomes a real address, unless the criminal is sufficiently advanced to have hooked onto an IP-hiding network, or so. As technical evidence and in the context of investigation, all amounts are equal. Due to my personality-disorder, I am accustomed to being misunderstood, and I am accustomed to being unable to understand why others do what they do. Yet, no matter how often it happens, it still hurts. Under force, I sat in the chair by the wall and was picked on by the police-dude. I guess I had a choice all along, to withdraw the report and ask permission to go home. At least, I assume I did. Was that the point? Was the purpose of his behaviour to chase me home without reporting the crime? If that wasn't the purpose, then what was? Does the police do these things for fun? We spent a lot of time in that interrogation room. It felt like hours, but I think it was only one, or a half. I had no clock. In the beginning he alternated between asking questions and criticising my answers. A good deal of time passed that way. He made a big deal out of me not knowing the 16-year old's surname. He was hugely unimpressed that I had a business-card with the 16-year old's step-father's cell-phone number. He mocked the name on the card. (What kind of a name is this?) This police-dude had a tendency for slow head-shaking and frequent nose-wrinkling. For the first time, he thrummed on his keyboard and said that the phone-number on the card wasn't registered to that name. "Are you aware what this phone number is registered to?" he then asked. "No," I replied, and elaborated that I really didn't know anything about that. That card was one I had been given by the kid's step-father, when he came by to check what kind of people we were --shortly after the (then not) 16-year old started coming to our home. I had used the number on that very card, to contact the very same man, when I, by going through the withdrawals from my credit-card, could narrow the amount of probable suspects down to one. The letter from Fyns Politi is dated July 29th, 2009, the very same day I reported the crime. Near the end of the long interrogation, the police-dude said something about intending to call some days later, either to hear if I had found out the surname of the 16-year old, or to tell me that he had done it himself. He didn't. Call me, that is. Several days passed from the moment I first read the letter, till I realised what it actually said, apart from "...decided not to investigate..." The full wording of the letter is: "I have today, according to the "retsplejelov" (((Danish word referring to laws of administration of justice))) §749, stk. 1, decided not to investigate the matter of abuse of visa/dankort from your address in the period 290609 to 250709. An eventual claim of compensation must hereafter be raised in by civil lawsuit. If needed, further information can be supplied by enquiry to the local judges office. I have in my decision, primarily weighed that you have explained that your home is visited by many young people, whose names you don't know, and whom you allow to play computer. The misuse is of a smaller amount, and according to the informed there has been no loss, since all the money has been, or will be, returned. You can complain about the decision, according to the complaint-guide. The complaint can be sent to present police or to the public prosecutor, whose address is Kongevej 41, 6400 Sønderborg.. The time limit for sending in a complaint is 4 weeks from having been informed of the decision." (quote end) In spite of having been informed of my social-phobias, the dumb swine exposed me to an aggressive, degrading, interrogation for more than half an hour. (Excuse my choice of words, I am agitated.) And then he can't even keep the facts straight. There has been no abuse of visa/dankort from my address. The scoundrel haven't had opportunity to do it from my home. The one or two times he has briefly been by and said hi, since the day the information has to have been copied while I was at the loo, he hasn't been sitting at one of our computers unsupervised. Actually, it is rather impudent to come by and greet the victim amicably, while one is still abusing their credit-card on the internet. But, on the other hand, it's always cold-blooded to commit fraud, especially to people you know. Personally, I can't put myself into those shoes. I'd never have done it, not even when I was 16. "...many young people, whose names you don't know..." He could at least have shown the courtesy to write "surnames". I am on first name basis with everyone I know. I don't ask people their last name, and have no reason to remember same last names if offered. It is correct that, over time, a lot of young people has visited my boyfriend's home, which now is my home too. But, at the moment, there aren't many. In the weeks prior to the credit-card-abuse, there has only been, in total, four different. Two 12-13 year old regulars, the 16-year old, and (once, accompanying the 16-year old) another 16-year old. Thinking about it, I wasn't given a chance to tell how many had visited in the period just prior to the abuse. The only thing the police-dude wanted to know was how many kids had frequented the place over the years. And that number, that is many. It just isn't very relevant. I have trouble imagining a child or a teenager, writing down credit-card information to store it for months, half a year, or longer, to only then start using it. Apart from my personal trust, there is, in my opinion, two reasons the two 12-13 year olds are completely unsuspectable in the matter. First of all, they aren't old enough to figure out how to create a fake paypal account, secondly, I know their individual game-interests, and none of the small ones play the game which the hustler has used five amounts on. Hence, one suspect, one 16-year old whose buddy is most likely in on the "game". "...The misuse is of a smaller amount..." Everything is relative. About 2000 crowns through paypal, about 1300 crowns on porn-websites, and about 200 crowns on the 16-year old's favourite online-game. All in all, fraud for over 3000 crowns (over 600 us dollars). "...no loss..." Financially speaking, I got off with a scare. There was a 3-400 crowns worth in withdrawals which I couldn't trace to a company, and hence couldn't get back. It might have been possible to get it back by "official objection" through the bank, but that would cost me 400 crowns in cab-fare expenses, so... Yes, 3-400 crows is less than it cost me to report the crime (400 crowns by cab = 80 us dollars). "...no loss..." He could at least have been so polite to write "no direct financial loss." But, yes, since I discovered the crime, and discovered it in time, I haven't suffered a significant financial loss. And, no, the crime wasn't immensely traumatising. It was a shocking break of trust, but, if not for the behaviour of the police, it probably wouldn't have kept me sleepless for long. At the bottom of the letter a name is written by machine. It is decorated by a neat, handwritten, signature. Is that the name of the guy who interrogated me? I don't know. His name and face are still fully erased from my memory. Vanished without a trace. He wasn't old and he was of ordinary build. I wouldn't even be able to tell if he was in uniform or plain clothes. Is he aware that the psychological abuse could have killed me? Luckily it didn't. I think I need about 2-3 more rounds like that before I kill myself. When I got home that day I wished I were dead. But I didn't do anything about it. If I had, I couldn't write this. Believe it or not, but I'm ok intelligent, if I with finality decide to kill myself I will succeed in the first go. I am not the type to half-heartedly commit failed suicide as a means to cry for help. I was once the type who cried for help for believing I was about to do it, but that is another story. I am perfectly aware that the mere mention of suicidal tendencies is enough to make most people despise you, but that fact can't change that deathfantasies is one of the things that have helped me through the days since the interrogation. When your stomach contracts so hard it hurts, and you are sobbing so hard that each exhale is a miniature scream. In other words, when you are hysterical due to emotional pain, it helps to think about death. In this moment, right here and now, while you are sitting, or lying, or standing, you might have a lethal cancer and simply not be aware of it, because it hasn't yet displayed noticeable symptoms. Normally that is a frightening thought. If you think too much about it, it makes your heart beat faster. Your fingers might start tingling a little bit and/or you might get a little dizzy and cold. But, when you are really feeling bad because life sucks and everything looks bad, then it is a comforting thought. Not only that. If you really dive into the fantasy and think about the reality of death, I don't know if it's a scientific fact, but I swear, you can practically feel the calming endorphins. You don't get high or low, you just become emotionally numb. (This is not a recommendation. I am fairly certain that deathfantasies are bad for you in the long run.) Suicide-thoughts and deathfantasies. No, unless I am exposed to another severe trauma in the near future, I am in no danger. And, believe me, I will make sure to stay far away from the police-station, at least until the kommune (((Danish word for a local division, explanatory: a kommune has a Mayor.))) supplies me with a "support-person" who can hold my hand and make sure the bad, bad policemen doesn't treat me badly. Personally I hope that I will never again need to set food in a police-station. Since I am a rather law-abiding citizen (and don't go out much) my chances of avoiding the police are pretty good. If you are exposed to crimes, you can simply refrain from reporting them. I thought I had an obligation to report crimes committed against me. (Seen from the next victim's point of view it is preventive.) But, when the police puts an effort into scaring me into not reporting, shouldn't I then take it as a hint? Unfortunately, I am the type of person who thinks, "What if..." What if one day I'm raped? I don't get out much, so it's not very likely. But what if one of my (few) internet-fans should turn out to be a psycho and got it in his head to track me down and... Deathfantasies or not. Under those circumstances, I wouldn't be able to survive the reporting-torture. I am not very strong. The hardships of every day living often demands more strength than I've got. That in spite of me being retired. I don't think I could stand the shame of letting it pass unnoticed. So what if? It is a nauseating feeling when a crime is committed to one. It is even more nauseating that the criminal gets away with it. But, worst of all is the treatment which the police adds to it. My view on the world has been turned somewhat upside down. My only personal experience with crime and police tells me that the police are worse than the criminals. The police has done me more harm than criminals. The criminals take what they want, or what they can get, it's not personal. The police makes it personal if you are stupid enough to report a crime... No. I really hope there is something I have misunderstood. I misunderstand so easily. Almost as easily as others misunderstand me. The glimpses. The further into the interrogation, the messier they are. The further into the interrogation, the harder it was for me to think clearly. Was it about halfway through that he stopped asking questions which could in any way have any relevancy to an investigation? It's so messy. My replies must have been messy around that time too. He asked if I had an interest in seeing the 16-year old punished. How he expressed it I can't say. At that time he had already been harassing me for a long time, and I had huge difficulties thinking coherently. In the wisdom of hindsight, I wanna say, "You know what. Taking a stand on that matter, is not, at all, my responsibility." But that wasn't what I said. I can't remember what I said, can't even remember if there was a longer exchange of words between his question and my answer. I think I was defending my decision to report the crime. I did that at, at least, one point, I remember that much. Every time he mocked me for something, I guess I opened my mouth and defended myself as best I could. It's human nature. When your back is against the wall, you defend yourself till you are broken or unconscious. I get nauseous just thinking about it, but I'm not ready to repress it. Yet. Well, anyway, as I was saying: I can't remember the route from his question to my final answer. But, in the end, my answer was that I had no interest in the 16-year old being punished. Then the police-dude flipped over (metaphorically speaking) and harshly stated that, "If he is convicted he will be punished." What I replied to that I don't know, I doubt it was as insightful as, "That is not my responsibility." Whatever I said I guess it was fairly clear, for the police-dude changed the subject. I can't remember the order of the next two subjects he took up. They were mixed into each other. Oh dear. Just trying to remember what it was like makes me dizzy and gives me trouble concentrating. I was about to tell of two subjects, now I only remember one. "How well do you know (the name of the 16 year old)," he said, about like that, and went on to ask how I expected the kid would react when the police contacted him regarding the matter. Utterly confused, I asked what he meant. The police-dude elaborated his question, asking if it was imaginable that the kid would get angry to be reported and what the kid might do about that. Utterly flabbergasted, I said something like, "Do you mean, if he is likely to break in while we sleep, with a butcher-knife in hand? Or so?" The police-dude then explained that he wasn't exactly thinking of butcher-knives, but young people could think up all sorts of stuff. He used the word "harassment", and pointed out that I and my boyfriend were extra exposed due to our situation. Well, I ate that hook, bait and all. I started gabbling senselessly about all the things I could imagine, now that he had set off my imagination. I blabbed and gabbled. I assume my rambling was quite coherent, although far-fetched. It's embarrassing to think of all the crap you say when you are under pressure and can't think coherently. Especially when you are me. He let me ramble. The starting-point of the rambling was that I hadn't foreseen that the kid might steal my credit-card information to swindle for thousands of crowns. Since I didn't know he might do that, well, then I couldn't know what else he might do. Meaning, from my point of view, he might do anything. My imagination isn't just good, it's amazing, not to say hyper-active. If you ask me to think out the theoretic consequences of something then... Well, I am a 'What if'-person. I gabbled. Gabbled about all the things I on standing foot could imagine that young people could do to harass adults to whom they held a grudge. It feels strange to use the expression 'on standing foot' about a situation in which I wasn't permitted to stand. It is nauseating to remember that I was in a situation where I wasn't allowed to stand. Yes, I have a good imagination, but the conclusion to it was that if a vindictive scoundrel should manage to turn our lives into a nightmare then we could always move to another part of the country. With that conclusion, I stood by my decision to report the crime. To tell something chronologically, to tell something in the time-wise correct order. I can't remember the order of the part of the interrogation where the police-dude was focusing on the consequences of reporting. It is a mess in my memory. Maybe it was a mess in reality too. I remember he managed to make me nervous about the consequences. The police-dude put a lot of weight on this: If he was going to investigate anything, his first step would be to get in direct contact with the 16-year old. I can't think straight. My stomach hurts and I am dizzy. I have to go further back. Back to the raw facts. The concrete and very tangible. IP-addresses become real addresses if you have a warrant. Unless the swindler has used an IP-hiding network. The majority of the 17 amounts have been made by big professional companies. Professional internet-companies log IP-addresses and times of payment. Before the reporting-interrogation, (before I went to the police-station), I had called the police. The police-dude I got on the line had told me that they didn't have time to investigate small cases, so small cases typically wouldn't be investigated. That is how it came to be, that when I went through the withdrawals I didn't just think about getting back my money. I also wondered if I could help clear up the matter. I imagined that if the case was all set even before being turned over to the police, then they might investigate. It couldn't harm. Whatever I should find out, they wouldn't need to use. After thorough consideration, I wrote one page of notes to the police. I called it 'informationer til politiet'. This is what it said: (quote) Here is a list of the payments from which IP-addresses are most easily retrieved. Regarding the amount 376,02 and the amount 188,01 both dated 01/07: These two are paid through XXXXX, more specifically, they have been paid through XXXXX, which can be found on the website of same name. This company is easy to contact through phone: tlf. +1 xxx xxx xxxx The phone is answered by English-speaking personnel. They are in possession of date, time, IP-address and any other information supplied by x. They gave me two IP-addresses, en for each withdrawal. Out of fear that I might have noted one or more ciphers wrong, I'd rather not convey these two IP-addresses directly. (xxxxx is a company who specialises in transferring online payments between private persons and commercial websites, especially porn-trading websites use xxxxx.) Regarding four different withdrawals of the amount 39,99 and one withdrawal of 49,00. All attached this information xxxxx. "xxxxx" is an online computer-game, for which you can pay online. They won't give out information to private persons, but informs that they are very co-operative toward authorities of a variety of nations. They wrote this in an e-mail to me: (quote) (((note this is a quote within a quote, this quote was originally in English, hence haven't been translated here.))) If you feel it is necessary, you may want to contact a member of your local law enforcement agency. We do work closely with many Law Enforcement agencies and co-operate fully with any official investigations. All law enforcement agencies can contact us at XXXX@XXXX.com (quote end). (((note end of a quote within a quote))) Meaning, they are easy to contact by e-mail, in English. e-mail: xxxx@xxxx.com. (quote end.) All in all, with the aid of one phone call and one e-mail, the police could get hold of 7 IP-addresses with attached time and date. That's as 'all set' as a case of internet-crime can be. If it should then turn out that the criminal was sufficiently advanced to be hiding behind an IP-hiding network, along with pedophiles and, (it is claimed,) diplomats, one could always cease investigating. One can assume all sorts of stuff. At some point in the early part of the interrogation, the police-dude cast a despising glance at first the 'informationer til politiet'-paper and then me. Seeing the Police "What is this?" he asked, momentarily holding out the paper. I explained that those were the 7 amounts (out of the 17) which could most easily be tracked to real addresses. "But doing stuff like that adds to the 'case expenses'*," he said, full of resentment. At least, he sounded like he was full of resentment. (((case expenses referring to the Danish word "sagsomkostninger", I do not own a dictionary specialising terms.))) I think it was a bit after that, that he said that thing about not investigating anything unless he had a name and an address of a suspect. Sometime during the investigation, I explained that, most likely, I could get name and address of the 16-year old from the other kids' parents, once they were home from summer vacations. I couldn't (and can't) see what difference that should do if following the IP-trail shouldn't lead to the 16-year old, who I am 98% sure did it. I doubt that opportunity and a partiality for the game xxxxx as only evidence holds up in court. (It certainly shouldn't hold up in court.) As far as I remember, I asked about some of it. I'm not quite sure how it all went down. If only I had been superhuman, I would have been able to put myself above the effect of being ordered into the humiliating seat in the chair by the wall, and would calmly have been able to analyse the police-dude's derogatory attitude and aggressive approach. I could then calmly have refrained from gabbling and asking questions, and instead merely have answered any questions as briefly and concisely as possible. On the other hand, if I were superhuman, it wouldn't matter how embarrassing I acted, nor how mean the police-dude acted. Because then it wouldn't bother me. Sometimes I wish I were a sociopath, or whatever it is they call the people who aren't emotionally involved in (or affected by) social interaction. The more general my view becomes, of what actually happened in that room, the more I am inclined to believe that, even before we entered that room, the police-dude had decided that I were a menace and needed to be brought down. What else am I supposed to think? I could make up a fantasy of him already being familiar with the case before I arrived. Of him being a personal acquaintance of the 16-year old's family, thus having a personal reason to make me withdraw the report. Otherwise I could believe another's guess and conclude that the police-dude in question merely was an incompetent, mean-spirited, asshole. Under all circumstances, I've concluded that if you are mentally vulnerable, you shouldn't go see the police alone. It is far too risky. I'm not too sure I'd dare to go back there even with a support-person holding my hand. It's probably best if I keep hiding at home. Because I'm not quite normal and, in the end, it's probably just me that's wrong. Right? * It's been some weeks since I wrote all that. Writing it down, helped. Nearing the expiration date for complaining about the police's decision, I still didn't have a support-person yet commenced on the process of complaining. It's not that I really care where that case will go. I just feel a basic need to find out if things are meant to be that way around here.