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Out of jail, arrestees ponder new year

Some greet 2007 with renewed resolve to improve their lives. Others, not so much.

By BEN MONTGOMERY
Published January 2, 2007

TAMPA - If there is a time and place for penance, it's New Year's Day on the blue benches in front of Hillsborough's Orient Road Jail.

One by one, nearly 100 people were released Monday, according to the Sheriff's Office jail logs.

Some of their resolutions were humble, others angry.

"I'm going to get myself a job," said Eddie Rosado, 21, who was charged with trespassing after police found him sleeping behind the Goodwill on Hillsborough Avenue.

"Get myself a life."

Some, like Rosado, have been incarcerated since Christmas, so they had plenty of time to think through plans for personal improvement.

Others barely had a chance to smell the inside of a cell, a fact their resolutions illustrated.

"I've resolved to never go to Whiskey Park again," said David Schwab, 30, a Palm Harbor man who owns a real estate appraisal business and swears he was auxiliary - nothing more - to a skirmish at Tampa's upscale SoHo bar the night before.

Schwab stood in the breezeway outside the jail eating Baked Doritos and cursing the police who arrested him, the jail that held him for eight hours and whoever caused his $150 shirt to be stained with road grit.

"My attorney's going to have a field day with this," he said.

Nearby, Keyna White waited alone for a cab. She has been thinking a lot lately about going to work as a medical assistant.

That's Resolution No. 1.

"Get a real job," said the 25-year-old mother from Tampa.

She had been locked up on a petty theft charge since Dec. 14 because she could pay only half of a $90 cab fare from Bradenton to Tampa. She said it would have been nice to end 2007 somewhere besides here.

"The food was ridiculous," she said. "They fed us some sort of meat ground up and some sort of fake tomato sauce and the noodles were all mushy."

Resolution No. 2. Eat better.

"I'll just start over completely," she said. "That's what New Year's is for."

With their possessions in shrink-wrapped pouches, they sat on the benches and waited for taxis to carry them away.

They were tired. Sober. Dirty. Embarrassed. Angry.

Adam Azzi pushed through the doors and tore into his shrink-wrapped items. He noticed Schwab nearby.

"I make $300,000 a year and they're going to tell me I'm resisting arrest?" he said. His shirt, too, was dirty.

"I know," Schwab said. "Isn't that a constitutional right? The right to assembly?"

He thought for a second. He had several scrapes on his head.

"My civil rights have been violated," he said.

Eddie Clarence Thomas walked by with a bag full of clothing. The 54-year-old was released after serving 21 days for trespassing.

His crime? He was sleeping under a bridge beneath Interstate 275, he said.

He made a pact with God this year. The time served was something of a mixed blessing.

"The slate has not been wiped clean," he said. "But I'm trying."

Across the street, a neon sign in the window of Orient Road Bail Bonds said OPEN in Christmas colors. Another taxi pulled to the curb under gray skies. A man stood, gathered his stuff from a bench and walked toward the car.

"Happy new year, everybody!" he said.

Ben Montgomery can be reached at bmontgomery@sptimes.com or 813 661-2443.

[Last modified January 1, 2007, 23:48:34]