Geocaching Fiasco: Part Three

We were lucky enough to attend a congregation that had many lawyers in it.  Unfortunately none of them were criminal defense attorneys.  They did have hook-ups though and soon we had an attorney.  Our first appointment with him we went in semi-light heart-ed.  We were trying to see the humor of it all. We left broken heart-ed and stressed.

I don't want to go into too many details of that meeting.  The feelings are still raw and I don't want to think about it. It was rough.  It was intense.  There were a lot of tears.  When I'm pregnant, once the tears start flowing, I can't make them stop, and this was no exception.

Basically we were told this was much more serious than we thought it was. We were told that it while it was very likely we could get the charges dropped, it was not certain.  We were told that they had seen Caleb as "cocky" and it made matters worse. We were told that this was quite possibly going to cost us around $10,000 because even if we got the charges dropped, it was likely we'd get sued by all the businesses who had been shut down for the money they lost. We were also told that the city might sue us for the money they lost calling in the troops.

We were young.  We didn't have a lot of money saved up.  We had no debt and had just paid off all of our cars and we had a teeny bit of money in savings.  That was it.  We were in no place for this financial burden. I'm anal about money and cannot stand not having some savings for a rainy day.  I was so sick to my stomach about being in debt.  I couldn't believe we were likely going to spend hours in court and away from my sweet babies.  It was just crazy.

Luckily it did not take a lot of time to get the charges dropped.  I believe it took a couple of weeks.  That was a relief.  Then we waited anxiously to see if any businesses would sue us.  At about the four month mark we felt relief and were starting to think it a done deal and we were good to go.

Then we received a bill in the mail from the city for a little over $4,000 for costs accrued.

Geocaching Fiasco: Part Two

They searched our house and computer because I had shown them the geocaching website.  Meanwhile I am pacing trying to keep calm but getting more upset by the minute.

Finally, I can't remember how long it took them to bring me our son, but it was awhile.  The officer opened the door with my boy in his arms. I reach out and ripped him from his arms, crying.  He said, "Ma'am you know we had to look into it.  We had to take precautions. You have to understand."  I sad, "No.  My husband and son went out to play a game together and you arrested my husband and took my son.  I don't feel like being understanding right now."

He was a kind man and gently talked to me.  He told me that it had all been a mistake and that my husband would be home soon.  He also told me it had been a huge ordeal.  They'd called in all the reinforcements they could ICE, the bomb squad, the FBI, sheriff's department and police officers from ours as well as surrounding cities. They had shut down an entire section of the city, including several businesses.

After this everyone left our house telling me my hubby would be home soon.  I tried calling several friends, one a geocaching buddy of Caleb's, and one being my neighbor and a fellow parishioner at our church. I couldn't stop pacing.  They had told me they had pulled him over close to our house so I kept loading up the kids in a stroller and walking up the road trying to see if I could see anything.  After a couple of hours I started calling all the places they could be holding him.  He had not been booked anywhere so they couldn't tell me where he was. At some point someone called our Bishop.  He's a pretty assertive and feisty guy.  He called me and I told him that although they said Caleb would be home soon, he was still not home.  He told me to take my kids somewhere, he was picking me up, we were going to go find him.

I dropped our little people off at the neighbors and Bishop and I went on the hunt. We went to several places and they'd say, "We can't tell you where he is."  Bishop was like, "You can and you will." It worked. We finally found out he was at the Sheriff's station.

Even after they ascertained that it was not a bomb, they arrested him.  They charged him with something like interfering with the work of a police officer. I went to get bail money but the banks were closed and you can only get so much out of an ATM so we had to go to Bishop's bank too and get money out of his account.

The Bishop had somewhere to be so our Elder's Quorum president (another leader from church) came to sit with me. I didn't know him that well at the time but he was a great guy to have to sit and wait with.  He was sympathetic and funny and made waiting a lot easier.  We waited for quite awhile.  When I was filling out some paperwork a police officer came up to me and whispered, "I'm a geocacher.  This is crap." And then he was gone.

Sometime late that night he was released.  It was a relief but then we realized they had impounded our car.  We got a ride home, and took our second car down to pay to get the car out of impound.

We were so relieved we were kind of slap silly at this point.  We were blown away by the whole thing but mostly just relieved.  We thought it was mostly over.  We were wrong.

Geocaching Fiasco: Part One

Seven years ago January, my husband was arrested (until I finish the story, I want to add here that he did not break the law and all charges were eventually dropped).  I have searched and searched for where I wrote the original story and cannot find it, so I'm writing it again.  One because it's entertaining, two, the lessons we learned need to be recorded.

I was sick.  I was in my first trimester of my third pregnancy.  We had two kids, a boy and girl, ages three and one.  My husband was a huge fan of geocaching.  He needs hobbies to keep his busy mind occupied.  His big brother introduced him to it while visiting us and Caleb was instantly obsessed.  I had/have a love hate relationship with it.  Love because it has gotten us out there to see and do things we wouldn't have otherwise, hate because it can be time consuming and while traveling can make trips really, really long.

On this particular day, I was extremely sleepy.  It was time for our daughter to nap and I planned to lay down with her. The hubs didn't actually want to geocache on this particular day, but I asked him to take our son out and let me rest in peace and quiet.

At one point he headed straight for a small geocache hidden inside of a lamp post at Academy Sports.  There is not a lot (or maybe not any) public land in Texas so more geocaches were hidden inside of the city limits than in other states.  He had tried to get this one before but there had always been "muggles" (non-geocachers) about.   This time he pulled right up to it, hopped out and left the car running, quickly pulled out the geocache, signed the paper inside, stuck it back in the post and drove away.

Meanwhile I'm at home sleeping.

I was woken by a knock at the door.  Two plainclothes police officers were standing there, "Are you married to a Caleb Osborn?" "Um, yes." "He's been arrested."  My hand actually flew to my heart like an old-time movie.  Then I laughed. "You're joking right?  My husband?  Short, quiet Caleb?  What could he have done?"  I'm thinking it's a prank of some sort.  He had some goofy co-workers at the time.

"We can't tell you what he was arrested for but is there somewhere in the house he would go that you wouldn't know about?"  "Um....well I wouldn't know about it, right?" I'm being a little snarky because at this point I still think it's some sort of joke.

Sheepishly, "Well, ma'am we need to look through your house."  Then it hit me.  They mean business.  It also hit me what was probably happening.  Every geocacher knows it's a possibility.  "Oh my gosh. He's geocaching.  Playing a game.  You know with GPS units and tupperware. Do you think he planted a bomb?!"

At that point I let them in.  I really believed in our justice system and didn't think twice about letting them look around.  One of the police men knew what geocaching was and I saw it in his face when he realized it was all a big mistake.  However, he had to follow protocol.

"Wait?! Where's my son?!"  It had taken me a minute to realize I had no idea where my little boy was.  That was the point where I started to get very angry and and upset.  "He'll be home in a bit ma'am." I can't remember where they said he was, I just remember they said he'd be home soon and that I started shaking as I do when I get any sort of adrenaline rush, but especially when I'm angry.