L.A. Justice
As Ida Gutierrez, 44, a restaurant cashier, stepped from a 4 bus at Melrose and La Brea last Aug. 26 a woman who got off at the same time grabbed at a half-open package and excitedly accused her of stealing “her” gray sweater, the sleeves of which were hanging loose.
Miss Gutierrez, flabbergasted at the outburst, said this was not true, she had just bought the two sweaters in the package at a Wilshire Blvd. store. She thought the woman was mentally disturbed.
The woman persisted and they went into a service station and called police. Miss Gutierrez assumed they would clear the matter.
Two officers responded. One talked to Miss Gutierrez, the other to the woman. Apparently they reached no conclusion and the two were taken to Hollywood station. After questioning, they were released. The sweaters were held as evidence.
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Around midnight Oct. 12 two officers came to her home with a warrant for her arrest, searched her apartment and took her to City Jail. She was booked, fingerprinted and mugged and bail was set at $500. CONFUSED AND outraged, Miss Gutierrez appeared in court the next day and pleaded not guilty. Her bail was reduced to $100 and trial date set for Nov. 3.
On Oct. 15 she asked a jail attache if she could write a letter out of jail. The woman was sympathetic but said she had to find her own way to get the pencil, paper and 4-cent stamp. She finally prevailed upon another prisoner who was writing a letter to enclose a note to her friend. The friend received the note and bailed her out Sunday morning, Oct. 18. She had been in jail one week. During that time she had slept two nights on the floor, was denied a comb and wore her own dress, not having been given a uniform. She also lost both jobs. ON NOV. 2, the day before her trial date, she was notified to appear at the city attorney’s office. The woman who had brought the charge told her story, the officer told his, Miss Gutierrez told hers. Then Miss Gutierrez asked the other woman what size the sweaters were. She said they were both 36. Miss Gutierrez demonstrated that one was a 36, the other a 34. She produced the sales slip showing she had paid $14.54 for them and pointed out that no one had bothered to look at the size tags on the sweaters during the two months they were held as police evidence. They were unmistakably 36 and 34. The deputy said the case would be dismissed if Miss Gutierrez would sign a release stipulating that there had been “probable cause” for her arrest. She didn’t understand why she had to sign such a statement and did so reluctantly. BUT MISS Gutierrez doesn’t feel that just dropping the case is enough for the injustice done her. Until her arrest, her record was clean. She had never been in jail or court. “I want my integrity restored,” she said tearfully. “There is a stigma on my name. I don’t want the police to have my fingerprints and my picture.” Asked why the case, seemingly so trivial, was pushed so hard, she said she didn’t know except that the officer had said derogatory things about Mexicans. Ironically, she comes from South America. She has been in this country 12 years, has been a citizen for more than five years. However, she speaks with a Latin accent. The intervening weeks have not healed the wound to her dignity or quieted her fears. “I live in terror,” she said. Apparently it could happen to anyone. |
ON SEPT. 14 MISS GUTIERREZ received a notice from the city attorney’s office to appear for a hearing on a charge of petty theft. But the sergeant who had escorted her to the station at the time of the incident kept calling her, she said, advising her to ignore any such notices, and she didn’t go. Besides, she was working at two jobs, trying to pay hospital and funeral bills. Her mother died in July.
She was permitted to phone her landlady to ask her to feed her parakeet, but was instructed not to say where she was calling from.
ladailymirror.com 
“and there is nothing new under the sun.” – Ecclesiastes 1:9
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