Features

Police Blotter

By MATTHEW ARTZ
Tuesday October 21, 2003

Drunken Man Sets Jail Fire  

A homeless man arrested for public drunkenness Friday afternoon proved even more dangerous in jail than on the street. Police found Brett Walker, 37, in a bellicose mood in the 3000 block of San Pablo Avenue, and when they tried to arrest him, Walker fought and tried to flee. Once he’d been overpowered, officers took him to the jail at Berkeley Police headquarters, where the trouble really started. In the room where he’d been sent to make his obligatory telephone call, Walker smashed the phone. Officers then locked him in a solitary cell, from which the smell of smoke began wafting soon thereafter. When officers went to chewk, they found that he had set his bed ablaze and ignited the sheets—which he then pushed them under the cell door, setting fire to it as well. Police quickly extinguished the fire and did not need to evacuate the jail. Police reports did not say how the fire was set. Walker was then sent to a third cell where he repeatedly punched the Plexiglas window. Charged Walker with arson, damage to jail property and public intoxication, police sent him on his way to Santa Rita County Jail. 

 

Drug Arrest 

Police arrested two men they say they spotted drinking booze in their car at 9:12 p.m. Saturday evening. Officers in a patrol car driving on the 2300 block of Curtis Street—a noted drug hotspot—spotted the pair in a parked car, and one of the officers recognized one of the men as a parolee. When police approached the car to conduct a search, the passenger reached over and grabbed something, which he began to crush them. The officers ordered the man to drop the substance and then collected the crushed pieces, which they subsequently identified as rock cocaine. Virgil Luckett, 59, of Berkeley and Reginald Patillo, 38, of Berkeley were arrested for possession of cocaine, drinking alcohol from an open container and violating parole and probation.