A woman recovering from a car crash in a Green Bay hospital was visited by a local police officer with a warrant for her arrest in Shawano County, as she had failed to return library books and DVDs totaling nearly $499, as reported by Fox 6 Now.
T.O., 30, said that she had a car accident on Mason Street when "the air bags went off. I ended up having damage to my scalp, my forehead and my left eye… I was still bleeding from my head. I was still on the stretcher when an officer came in to check if I was okay, how I was doing."
While T.O.'s injuries were not life threatening, and a doctor assured her she would soon be released, the police officer then told her that he "had a warrant for (her) arrest for Shawano County due to overdue library books."
The books were allegedly checked out from the Shawano library in 2011. According to T.O. she had forgotten about them.
After her release from the hospital T.O. was taken to the Brown County Jail. T.O. commented, "I thought he was joking, honestly. I couldn't believe it. I ended up laughing. The officer was laughing and then told me he was actually serious."
Shawano Police Captain J.H. told reporters, "If you fail to return items, you must be held accountable." Court documents show that T.O. and her daughter first checked out "Giant Octopus to the Rescue" and "Freddie and Flossie" books, and then months later checked out DVDs including "Mary Poppins." Neither the books nor the DVDs, 21 items in all, were ever returned.
T.O. contends that she never received a notice from the library about the overdue items. However, according to library director K.H., that would be highly unlikely. K.H. said, "I do hear that explanation at times. I think it's a very minimal possibility."
K.H. said that the library will make multiple attempts to contact people when they fail to return books – and the court documents show that at least five notices were sent to T.O. between both email and mail. After no response, the library forwarded the case records to the Shawano Police department.
K.H. said, "We're trying to work with people and it's kind of a last resort." The library policy is that if the item overdue is worth more than $25, and notices are ignored, the matter is then forwarded to the police. So far there have been 140 cases, representing thousands of dollars of library materials, sent to the police to be handled.
According to K.H., "…Most of the time if we're not able to have much feedback from a patron, it takes one quick contact by the police department and a patron responds pretty quickly."
The Shawano police also contacted T.O. prior to her arrest. Police records show that she met with an officer in April, and was told that if she failed to return or pay for the overdue items she would be getting a ticket.
One week after that no items had been returned and the police issued two tickets – and a mandatory order that T.O. appear in municipal court. T.O. failed to show up for the court hearings.
Whatever crime you have been charged with contact a criminal defense attorney to work with you on your case. Charged with anything from a single misdemeanor to several felonies, hiring a criminal defense attorney is your best bet.
