It is possible to be thankful every moment, every
day. It is possible to be thankful every moment,
every day. It takes practice and humility. It
takes vision and civility. Hi, and welcome to
Tell Me What Happened, the podcast that features
people from all walks of life talking about real
events from their childhood and how those events
impacted their lives. I'm your host, Jay Rehack.
And I love listening to stories from people's
childhood, which also helped me understand who
those people are. Tell Me What Happened is sponsored
by Sidelining Publishing, publishers of quality
books, including Susan Salador's children's book,
I've Got Peace in My Fingers, available worldwide
wherever quality books are sold. Tell Me What
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.com. Today I'm going back to my own childhood.
Tell you a story of my first arrest. I thought
it was kind of fitting because it demonstrates
a white privilege that I think translates into
what I call the benefit of the doubt. And my
hope is that everybody in the world gets the
benefit of the doubt when people are uncertain
about whether they're the good guy or the bad
guy, whether they're guilty or not guilty. And
I'm afraid that we live in a society where some
of us are given the benefit of the doubt and
some of us aren't. I think that is sort of a
huge element. of what I would call white privilege
or the idea of privilege. People sometimes struggle
with the word privilege. So I'm just going to
try to ask people to consider whether or not
in their own lives they get the benefit of the
doubt or not. So today what I'd like to do is
tell you the story of my arrest. My first arrest
when I was in high school. When I was 16 years
old. I want to start by saying that because I'm
a school teacher and my students may hear this
That arrest means my first stop the first time
I was stopped by a police officer so when I was
16 I Had a good friend of mine his name was Shawn
and Shawn had a brother named Mike and Mike Was
a little older than we were we were 16 he was
17 going on 18 and Mike had just signed up to
join the military and I think he was having second
thoughts I May have nothing to do with the story,
but I've always thought that's what happened
because One day one evening When I was riding
around with my friend Shawn in his car Shawn's
brother Mike was also with us and Mike asked
Shawn and I, if we could drop him off at a local
restaurant where his friend worked. And what
Mike told Shawn, and I suppose me because I was
in the car, was that he'd planned on either talking
with his friend or stealing his friend's car
battery. He was upset with his friend for some
reason and he was thinking about stealing his
car battery. I've always thought that maybe his
plan was to steal a car battery and get caught
and then somehow not have to go into the military.
That may have had nothing to do with anything,
but it struck me as a very weird thing to do
to want to steal your friend's car battery. Anyway,
Shawn was a law and order kind of a 16 year old,
believe it or not, and I certainly was too. And
Shawn said to his brother, he said, Mike, we're
going to come back in an hour. and if you have
a car battery in your hand we're just going to
keep on driving but if all you've done is gone
in and talk to your friend we'll come and pick
you up so that was the agreed upon decision that
we would come back if he had a car battery in
his hand we'd just keep driving because we weren't
going to help him steal a car battery anyway
an hour later we pull into the restaurant parking
lot and as we did eight suburban squad cars came
screeching into the parking lot with their sirens
blaring and their lights flashing and they circled
our car and they grabbed both Sean and I out
of the car rather forcefully and they threw us
up against the car and had us spread our legs
as if to check to see if we had any weapons I
suppose and me in my in my stupidity I turned
around and looked the cop in the face and said
relax I'm innocent or something like stupid like
that and the guy quickly pushed me back into
the car drew a gun and put it to my head and
said Do not take your hands off of the hood of
the car again. So I stood there and I was just
shaking, thinking I was in some kind of a dream.
And then they handcuffed us and put us into the
squad car, rather forcefully, not gently, let's
just say, and drove us to the local police station.
It was a suburb of Chicago by the name of Lombard.
And when we got there, they put Sean by himself
in one room, Mike in another room, and me in
another room. And then they had each of us tell
our version of the story. Mike confessed immediately
and said we had nothing to do with it. Sean told
the exact same story that I just told you, which
was we said, if you have the... Car battery Mike
were just gonna keep on driving. I said the same
story Shawn said the same story in the meantime
Shawn's parents came in to pick up Shawn and
Mike And as we're waiting to be picked up Shawn's
father turned to Mike and said Michael Michael
Michael, why did you steal the car battery? You
know, I would have given you the money for it
and Mike looked at his father and said no you
wouldn't And I don't know why I thought that
was funny, but I never forgot it and Then my
parents came to pick me up And my mother's crying
and she says something like JJ. What did you
do? What did you do and it hurt me to think that
way but my father and his In his beautiful moment
from my point of view said I know You didn't
do anything and That moved me because my father
and I were Not particularly close when I was
16 years old, but the fact that he had a hundred
hundred percent confidence in me made me feel
really good so Here's the thing I Call it White
benefit of the doubt because both Shawn and I
were honor students in school and We didn't really
I would say we didn't look like the criminal
type. I don't know what exactly but our stories
match, but we got lucky Because it turned out
that my friend Shawn was taking karate classes
with the chief of the Lombard Police Department
And so the chief of police Not only took care
of the fact that we didn't you know, we were
there were no charges filed but there were absolutely
no records around of the incident Mike still
got in trouble, but Shawn and I were nowhere
to list it anywhere and So I believe it was because
We were basically Yeah, given this benefit of
the doubt At the time I wouldn't have called
it privilege, but maybe I'm just parsing words
Because I did get arrested But I've often thought
as I mentioned I'm six foot three and I've often
thought And I also have a face that, when I'm
resting, my resting face is one that sometimes
people ask me if there's something wrong or if
I'm angry. And I'm not, but they think I am.
And I've often wondered if I were a black man,
a young man, or an African -American who'd had
this similar experience, if I'd turned around,
would that cop have shot me? Or I would have
been able to, quote unquote, talk my way out
of some sort of a charge against me. Somehow
that I'd have had to have to fought or had to
fight, you know, get a lawyer for it, etc. But
instead, absolutely nothing happened to me at
all or to Sean. Fast forward 48 years, my good
friend Sean is very, very high powered attorney
in New York City. He was also a prosecutor in
New York City. Highly successful. And I've been
a school teacher for 35 years. Suppose because
we were juveniles at the time if we had you know
faced some charges and had somehow lost the case
or whatever that maybe we'd still be The people
we are today or the professionals that we are
today, but I do believe that We because we were
given the white benefit of the doubt I'm not
dismissing that it isn't privileged, but I just
there's a subtlety of the language here That
we were given a break that meant that the mistakes
that we made didn't really cost us and That's
what I think everybody is entitled to the benefit
of the doubt And I don't think that our culture
Provides that benefit of the doubt for everybody
So that's my story I hope you enjoyed it. I also
want to thank everyone for taking the time to
listen to the story. Really appreciate it. Also
like to thank our sponsors, Sideline Inc. Publishing,
publishers of quality books, including Susan
Salador's children's book, I've Got Peace in
My Fingers, and Scott Summa's timely work, Don't
Act Like the President. available worldwide through
Amazon .com or wherever quality books are sold.
I'd also like to thank our other sponsor, LaughSaver
.com. LaughSaver .com invites you to go to their
website, Record Your Laughter, for free. They'll
keep it for you, now and forever. Your grandchildren
and their grandchildren will thank you for it.
That's LaughSaver .com. Now we're going to end
this show as we often do. with Susan Salador's
classic Every Moment, Every Day, which is available
on Spotify, BTW. Until next time, this is Jay
Reheck asking you all to stay safe out there
and try not to hurt anybody. It takes practice
and humility. It takes vision and civility. It
takes practice and humility. It takes vision
and civility. It takes beauty and the wisdom
to see it everywhere. It takes practice and humility.
It takes vision and civility. It takes beauty
and the wisdom to see it everywhere. It takes
practice and humility. It takes vision and civility.
It takes practice and the wisdom to see it everywhere.
It is possible to be thankful every moment, every
day.