Surprise Arrests Still Rankle Huntington Beach Residents

Back in the United States after serving in Operation Desert Storm and fresh out of the Marines, Roger Andrews, 27, and Kevin Duncan, 28, visited Huntington Beach in 1991 and eventually moved from Atlanta to Surf City in January.

But after both were arrested at a friend’s barbecue on the Fourth of July--one for drinking a beer on the porch and the other for holding an empty beer can on the front lawn--the men are less than enchanted with their new home.

“I was standing in the yard and I was chewing tobacco and spitting into a beer can when they pulled up and said we were under arrest for drinking in public,” Duncan said. “To me it seemed like a martial law situation.”

“What’s worse is I’m currently processing [for a job] with both LAPD and the Orange County Sheriff’s [Department] and I’m in the background stage on both applications,” he said. “This can’t possibly help.”

Anderson and Duncan were among five people arrested at the Acacia Street home of Carly Timoschuk, taken into custody for drinking in public although they were on private property. Timoschuk, 22, was one of them. Also arrested were Michelle Patterson, 21, of Huntington Beach and another man, who the group could not readily identify.

Police took about 575 people into custody on the Fourth of July, pursuing an aggressive policy of arresting anyone who violated any of the municipal drinking ordinances.

About 90% were booked either on charges of public drunkenness or drinking in public--an ordinance under a municipal code section that officers applied to many revelers drinking alcohol on their own property.

Depending on one’s point of view, the police action was either an unqualified success at keeping the peace, or an unnecessarily harsh measure that penalized citizens for behavior tolerated on any other day.

Police officials say they issued fair warning before the holiday that all laws would be strictly enforced.

“We said there was going to be zero tolerance and it was common knowledge that’s what we were going to do,” Lt. Luis Ochoa said.

Calls to the Police Department have been largely supportive of the crackdown, Ochoa said. No major injuries to either civilians or officers were reported, and given that only two complaints have been filed so far, the department counts the day as a success.

“I can understand how someone [arrested on private property] might feel--that’s where they live and they’ve done it before and they assumed they’d be able to do that again,” Ochoa said. “But we were open about what we were going to do and that basically we were going to enforce all laws. Period.”

Timoschuk, however, said she made an effort to follow the law, warning her guests not to throw water balloons or use squirt guns and not to drink alcohol on the sidewalk.

“We had just come back from the parade and were lighting up the barbecue when a big sheriff’s van pulled up right in front of my house,” she said. “Twelve men got out quietly, walked toward us, one of them said, ‘Are you ready, guys?’ and they started grabbing us, turning us around and tying up our hands.

“At first I thought it was a joke. And even when they arrested us, I thought they’d give us a warning and let us go. But after seven hours of freezing and starving in jail, it wasn’t funny anymore,” she said.

Andrews also couldn’t believe it.

“I was just sitting up on the front porch drinking a beer--it was my first one--when the police pulled up,” Andrews said. “I just sat there and kind of laughed, leaned forward to see who they were fixing to get and they come right at me.”

Sixteen hours later, he was released.

“They told us they were trying to get the people who were starting early ‘cause they’re the ones that are gonna cause the problems later on,” Andrews said. “But how can they predict that we’re gonna do something wrong?”

Andrews isn’t moving away just yet, though.

“I’ll probably say here in Huntington Beach in spite of this, but I won’t do another Fourth of July here,” he said.