Straight Life - Art Pepper [181]
The next morning there's another knock on the door and here's my parole officer again-here he is and he's got two detectives with him. He says, "I want to talk to you. Is your wife home?" I say, "Wait a minute." And they waited for a minute, which I couldn't believe. I ran into the bedroom: there was an outfit and stuff in there. Another "possession." I woke Diane up. "The heat are here!" I said, "Take this. Get rid of it. Flush it. I'll keep them in the front room." I went out and said, "She's getting up." I closed the door into the hall. I said. "Well, what is it?" They said, "We've been informed that you know something about a burglary. We have to check you out." One of the detectives said, "Have you got anything in the house?" I said, "Anything what?" He said, "Anything anything. Anything at all." I said, "No." He said, "Do you mind if we search the place?"
They started their search and they found all these groceries. They'd look in a drawer and look at each other and raise their eyebrows and nod. My parole officer told my old lady, "We've got a complaint. We have to take him in." They took me outside, put handcuffs on me, and put chains around my stomach to hold the handcuffs. They told me to get into the front seat of the car. They drove me down to the station in Pasadena and put me in a cell. I couldn't find out what was going on, and I waited there for three days until finally they called my name. I walk out, and here's my parole officer. "We want to know if you'll give permission for a polygraph test. You've been accused of certain things. Our informant has given us definite information. If you're innocent you don't have anything to worry about. If you're guilty you won't want to take the test, and we'll just violate you." They had checked me for marks. I had marks. They could violate my parole. My only chance was to take the polygraph test.
I walked into a room, and here's the machine all set up. The guy introduced himself. He said, "You're taking this of your own free will? You haven't been coerced?" I said, "I guess you can call it that. If I don't take it, I'm admitting guilt. It's a nice game you got going." The machine looked like something out of science fiction with lights and dials and bubbles. I'm scared to death because I know exactly what they want to know. Even though I wasn't involved with the check protector and hadn't participated in the robbery, I was aware of what was going on and I was a recipient of its benefits.
The detective said, "I'm going to explain something." He hooks the machine on to me so when I answer a question they can tell by my heartbeat and perspiration the emotions the questions are evoking. If I tell a lie the dials register it. He said, "Just to show you that we don't want to trick you I'm going to read the whole thing to you before you start the test." This is the most diabolic part of all. I didn't realize it at the time. He said, "I'm going to start out by asking you your name." And he told me all the things that would be asked of me in the order they were going to be asked. When he finished he said, "Just to make sure there's no question about it, I'm going to run through it again." One of the questions was "Do you have knowledge of the burglary that took place at so-and-so?" And after that, "What was your mother's maiden name?" And then, "Do you own a dog?" Then, "Did you ever see a check protector?" And, "Do you know a person by the name of Arnold Samsa?" He would go back and forth like that, and because he went through it twice I knew the exact order of the questions he was going to ask. So when he asked me, "What did you have for lunch?" I knew the next question would be "Have you ever seen anyone forging the checks in question or forging