peared out of nowhere. He caught up with me, struck up a one-sided conversation, walked to the third movie with me (which I'd already seen, darn it) and then followed me over a mile home. Thinking he had robbery in mind, I walked fast, took detours and said goodbye at each corner. Later I wondered how obvious I must have appeared to him to cause this persistence, until he remarked to another officer in the patrol car that things had been very dull this week: "It's all I can do to keep up the old quota."

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Arriving home, and in front of a witness, I said another goodbye and unlocked the door: he pushed on by and entered uninvited. What followed would have been a nightmare even if he hadn't turned out to be vice squad. Sure now that this big character was a thug, I as the prosecutor described it "flitted wildly" from room to room wondering how to get rid of this person sprawled on the divan making sexual gestures and proposals. I was almost relieved when he strolled into the back bedroom because now I could call the police. What I'd have said to them, I don't know and what he'd have done if he'd heard, was up to luck. Then he called twice, "Come in here!" His voice was loud and commanding. He'd taken his jacket off, was sprawled on the bed and his shirt was unbuttoned half way down. During the tense conversation there, he asked me what kind of work I did, how much I made, and what the rent here was. Then he slapped the bed and said, "Sit down." Now he insisted that I was homosexual and urged me to "let down my

one

hair." He'd been in the Navy and "all us guys played around." I told him repeatedly that he had the wrong guy; he got angrier each time I said it. At last he grabbed my hand and tried to force it down the front of his trousers. I jumped up and away. Then there was the badge and he was snapping the handcuffs on with the remark, "Maybe you'll talk better with my partner outside."

The partner wasn't there. We walked all the way back to the park before finding him. Wearing handcuffs in public is an interesting experience. I was forced to sit with him in the rear seat of a car on a dark street for almost an hour, while he and the two officers in the front seat questioned me. It was a peculiarly effective type of grilling. They laughed a lot among themselves then, in a sudden silence, one would ask, "How long you been this way?" I sat on my hands and wondered what would happen each time I refused to answer. Yes, I was scared stiff. Then more laughter and shop talk and another sudden question. Some of them were about my work and pay. At last the driver started the car up; we went hardly more than ten miles an hour. Having expected the usual beating before, now I was positive it was coming out in the country somewhere. They drove over a mile past Lincoln Heights then slowly doubled back. During this time, they repeatedly made jokes about police brutality, laughingly asked me if they'd been brutal and each of the three instructed me to plead guilty and everything would be all right. He had approached me at five to nine in the park, I was booked at eleven-thirty and not allowed to send out a message till

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