A woman who was 'ranting in public' on Rodeo Drive was taken into custody and sent to a psychiatric hospital for evaluation before authorities realized she wasn't crazy after all... merely talking on her discreet cell phone.
BEVERLY HILLS — A woman shopping on Rodeo Drive yesterday was taken into custody by the police after they assumed she was mentally deranged. Only much later, after the woman was an inpatient at a local psychiatric ward did it become clear that she woman had merely been using a cell phone with an earpiece attachment.
Officer Rupert McDooley responded to a 911 call from a store owner that a "deranged woman is ranting and raving and pacing back and forth on Rodeo Drive." McDooley arrived at the scene and spotted the woman in question.
"She seemed very agitated and psychotic... I saw nothing to indicate that she was involved in a phone conversation per se." —
Officer McDooley, Beverly Hills police
"She seemed very agitated and psychotic," McDooley reported. "I tried repeatedly to get her attention — both visually and verbally — and to engage her in conversation, but she didn't respond. I saw nothing to indicate that she was involved in a phone conversation per se."
CALLING FOR HELP: The alleged cell phone abuser being carted away by police. The woman, Blanche Milquetoast, claims that she was having a "very important conversation" with her best friend and that she has "no recollection" of either being arrested or entering the psychiatric ward."
She went along willingly, that's for sure," admitted McDooley. "Wouldn't you think someone would get it — that they're being arrested? In hindsight, it seems obvious, but at the time we had no choice but to ship her over to the county psych hospital."
At the ward, Ms. Milquetoast not only went through an intake interview with a psychiatrist while still on the phone, but received her room assignment, attended an occupational therapy session, and was about to get showered by two attendants before finally terminating her conversation and inquiring with a staffperson, "How late is Tiffany's open?".
Milquetoast's friend on the other end of the phone, Bippy Limeburner, admitted that she could hear people in the background asking her friend questions. "So I was like, 'Blanche, hon', you'd better answer those people,' but she didn't listen. We sometimes really get into it and time passes in no time flat. She was really upset 'cause — … oh, will you excuse me? I should really answer that call."
Milquetoast defended her behavior, saying "Look, if I'm talking, I'm talking. I don't care if you're Joe Blow or the CIA, last time I checked it wasn't a crime to talk on the phone! My lawyers will be sending them a bill. We'll see them in court!"
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