Runaway Teddy Bear Makes the Blotter

“Cops” would be a whole different show in Sitka.

Instead of the sensational crimes that make people tune into the real-life TV show, police in Sitka are more likely to respond to . . . a man toting a foot-long plastic skeleton with a nail through its head. Or reports of two grown men playing on a sand pile.

A deer stuffed in a garbage can, a frozen teddy bear being hurled out a window, residents playing croquet too loudly after midnight and a report of a suspicious $1 bill also found their way onto Sitka’s police blotter in 1993.

“In Sitka and other small towns around the state, the police are familiar to you and you do call . . . with barking dogs or even teddy bears through a window,” said Sandy Poulson, publisher of the Daily Sentinel in Sitka, which regularly publishes blotter items.

Seventeen officers patrol the town of about 8,200 nestled on the Gulf of Alaska about 90 miles southwest of Juneau.

Lt. Nick Ward says his force also deals with serious crimes like sexual assault and robbery. “We’re not dealing with drive-by shootings every day, but certainly we deal with similar types of crime problems that the rest of the nation faces,” he said.

Indeed, there was one incident that could have happened in, say, the nation’s capital: a man in jogging shorts allegedly exposing himself.

Police discovered it wasn’t an intentional display and advised the man to wear longer shorts.