Compiled by Bethany Kohoutek bethany@dmcityview.com

Dispatcher: 911...

Dispatcher: What's the location of your emergency?

Caller: The Animal Rescue League... We have a juvenile whose mom is drunk and slapped her. She had two other [children] in a car. The juvenile we have inside the building. The mother, I believe, is still on the property. The mom does not have a license.

D: White female?

C: Yes. [In a] red Sunbird.

D: And you think she's still there?

C: She was five minutes ago.

D: As far as you know, she's outside?

C: Yeah, do you want me to go check?

D: Hold on, let me get some more information. You said she has another child?

C: Yes, a little sister and a niece, 4 and 5 years old... The girl I have with me, her stepmom is on the way to pick her up. I asked permission to call you guys; I figured it would be the best thing to do anyway... [The mother] was drinking while she was driving them around. She's got beer in the vehicle... Oh, the vehicle is not here. I guess she dropped [her daughter] off outside, toward the street.

D: Alright, we'll get somebody out to speak with you.

C: OK, thank you.

D: Alright, bye.

Officer's Report: I was dispatched to the Animal Rescue League or A.R.L. for an intoxicated woman who had been driving a car in the area, was in a dispute at the A.R.L. and left the area driving without her daughter... It was also reported that [she] still had two more children in the car with her when she drove away from the A.R.L. Polk County dispatch aired a broadcast for this vehicle to area authorities... I made contact with [the victim - the suspect's daughter] at A.R.L... [The victim] indicated that... she rode in the front passenger seat and that there were unopened containers of beer on the floorboard near her feet. [When her mother asked for a beer, the victim responded that she] would not hand her mother a beer and that she should not be drinking while driving. [The victim] indicated that as her mother drove the car, she reached into the floorboard area to retrieve a beer... [The victim] was able to move the beer out of her mother's reach. [The victim] indicated that her mother hit her approximately five times on the bridge of her nose and about the face area. [The victim] indicated that she then hit her mother approximately two times. [The victim] indicated that her mother then stopped the car and ordered, by shouting, her to get out of the car... Lt. Shoemaker... located the vehicle in the area of NE 22nd St. at NE Broadway Avenue, and conducted a traffic stop. I was summoned to the scene of this traffic stop and... I conducted the standardized field sobriety tests and upon [the suspect]... At 2011 hours, Deputy Onley conducted a preliminary breath test upon [the suspect] with a result of .167 percent blood alcohol content. I arrested... and transported her to the Polk County Jail for further testing without incident.

Docket diving

On New Year's Eve in 2001, three friends decided to ring out the year by traveling to Andalusia, Ill., for a day of snow tubing at Ski Snowstar Winter Sports Park, which is owned by the Iowa corporation Snowstar.

On what was to be their last run of the day, Mary Susan Gerischer, her husband Ryan, and their friend, Stacy Manning, got in line to ride the modified lift system to the top of the hill. At the park, tubes - with riders aboard - are hooked to a towing cable, which hoists them slowly to the crest of the hill. Midway up the lift, Mary Susan Gerischer's tube became unhooked, and she slid down the hill, eventually slamming into two poles at the bottom. According to her later court testimony, she suffered joint injuries, headaches and exacerbation of a pre-existing spine condition, which necessitated surgery.

Gerischer, along with her husband and children, sued Snowstar, seeking money damages for bodily injury, loss of spousal consortium and loss of parental consortium. They alleged that Snowstar was guilty of negligence, specifically that the employee responsible for hooking the tubes to the towing cable (brilliantly referred to in court documents as the "tube hooker") had failed to connect Gerischer's tube properly, or to instruct her on what to do when she began her backward descent.

A Jackson County jury ruled in favor of Snowstar, after learning that the park had posted numerous signs informing patrons that it was not responsible for "personal injury," and after hearing testimony from a witness who said he saw Gerischer herself fumbling with her tube connection, causing it to disconnect.

So why did the Iowa Court of Appeals last week overturn that decision and send the case back for a new trial?

The court wasn't evaluating whether the injury was the fault of Gerischer or the snow park. Rather, in the Gerischers appeal, they claimed that the jury had been tainted by biased instructions before heading to deliberation.

"Snowstar Corp. may be found negligent only if it owed and breached a legal duty to protect Plaintiff Mary Susan Gerischer from the injuries she sustained," jurors were told. Furthermore, a winter park facility cannot "guarantee to protect a snow tuber against the risks inherent in the sport."

The Gerischers maintained that their case had nothing to do with "inherent" risk - in other words, riders are liable for the risks intrinsic to the sport (falling down, inclement weather, etc.), but not for those due to outright negligence from park staff (such as a "tube hooker" failing to properly cinch the tow line).

According to Iowa legal precedent, "Prejudice results when the trial court's instruction materially misstates the law, confuses or misleads the jury, or is unduly emphasized." The Appeals Court ruled that this was the case in Gerischer v. Snowstar, and reversed the prior judgment in favor of Snowstar.

6,682 Number of missing persons reports filed in Iowa in 2004, the most recent year for which statistics are available.

Sucks to be you

Name: Bernedo Lowell Howard

Place of Incident: Downtown Des Moines

Posed for this picture because: Apparently fancying himself quite the ladies' man, Bernedo Howard approached a woman at a bus stop, and when the woman lied and said her name was "Diamond," Howard said he'd treat her "like a diamond and give her some pearls," before removing his junk from the trunk and pressing up against her, uninvited. Police arrived and took Howard to jail, where he was charged with public intox, indecent exposure and simple assault.

Best defense

The Iowa Court of Appeals rejected the appeal of Bobby Bailey, a Polk County man convicted in 2003 of murder, robbery and theft. The now-43-year-old Bailey claimed that his counsel was "ineffective" in defending him against charges that he murdered an 82-year-old man. Bailey admitted that he killed the man, saying that he did so in "self-defense," after the octogenarian solicited him for sex, then refused to pay him. The court tossed out Bailey's appeal, noting that his own testimony was "devastating to the theory of self-defense."

On the clock

Des Moines Police - May 13

8:00 a.m.

Burglary in the 1900 block of East Grand Avenue. Victim returned home from work and observed his front door unlocked and his apartment "ransacked," according to police reports. "An unknown suspect had climbed up onto the roof and smashed out a north window." The victim reported $3,500 in cash missing from a dresser drawer, and another $300 taken from a table top.

10:31 a.m.

Indecent exposure in the 4000 block of Forest Avenue. The victim was walking home from the state track meet on the north side of the street, when a man walking on the south side of the street pulled his shorts up, exposing himself to the victim. The victim kept on walking but didn't call police until she arrived at her mother's place of employment. The suspect was described as a white male in his 40s.

10:00 p.m.

Robbery in the 3000 block of University Avenue. Police were dispatched to a Walgreens store on University regarding the robbery of a vehicle. The female victim reported that as she was leaving Walgreens, two suspects approached her from behind. She was hit in the right and left elbows with an aluminum baseball bat. According to police reports, the victim dropped her purse and said, "Take it." When suspects demanded her keys, she dropped them as well. Suspects entered her car and escaped southbound on 31st Street. The victim refused medical attention at the scene.

(Alleged) drunk drivers

Name: Michael David Loffredo

Arrested: May 19

Second offense

Name: Ryan Cole Braget

Arrested: May 18

Second offense

Name: Adam Jeffery Sanders

Arrested: May 18

Second offense

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