Ride in a paddy wagon
Naples, Italy
I AM RETURNING from dinner, walking along a sidewalk in Naples, Italy, when two men zooming by on a Vespa motor scooter reach out and grab the purse off my shoulder. Holding tightly on to my bag, I am dragged into the street. I let go as they speed away, the thief sitting on the back of the Vespa looking over his shoulder at me, sprawled in the street, traffic approaching. My dinner companions pull me up to the curb, my arm bleeding, a look of surprise on my face.
A truck pulls over and some U.S. Navy guys, military police, jump out. They talk to me, encourage me to report the theft to the local police. Someone could use the Flying Tigers airline I.D. in my bag, they point out. Luckily, my passport is back at the hotel. The sailors give us a ride to the Naples police station.
I sit at a policeman’s desk, describe the incident with gestures and hand waving. Between two pilots and three flight attendants, we speak four languages but no Italian, and the cop speaks little English. A group of local kids crowds the doorway, watching the Americans, oohing when I pull up my sleeve to display my injury, a big scrape on my arm. I have road rash.
The cop pulls an unlabeled bottle of solution out of a file drawer, pours it on my scrape, stinging and dripping on the floor. He intently types his report on an ancient manual typewriter with two fingers, listing the contents of my purse, the amount of cash in my stolen wallet. Afterward, the policeman shrugs. “Earthquake, people hungry,” he tells me unapologetically, referring to the massive quake that struck the area the year before, killing 3000 people and leaving 300,000 homeless.
We ask for a ride back to our hotel. The official agrees, but only one vehicle is available, so we all pile into the police station’s paddy wagon. We sit on the benches in the back, no windows or lights illuminating this jailhouse transport. The driver securely locks and bolts the door from the outside, basically trapping the five of us inside the completely dark van. We nervously make jokes about emergency exits, fire, evacuation.
Once we arrive at our layover hotel, the driver unlocks the heavy door of the van to let us out. The hotel staff eyes us curiously as we climb out of the Black Maria and walk into the lobby.
The next year I claim the theft on my federal income tax return and enclose a copy of the police report, written in Italian, proof of my loss.