Arkansas Canoe Club Forums

So, I gather there was some major intervention in recovering Deb and Carey's raft. Would love to hear war stories. Dale

Cool, happy they have it back. I figure they would've called me if they needed me for support.

Cain't wait to hear the tale, myself.

Bob

Oh yeah. It was ugly. The two thugs didn't stand a chance against the angry mob of ACCer's. A few strong men threw the thieves into the raft and threatened to send them down the falls with no paddles (or beer). When they screamed like a girl and begged for mercy they were allowed back onto dry ground where they were happy to put out their wrists to be handcuffed by the rangers and hauled off to the land of arid deserts and no moving water.

Now that's what I'm talking about!!!!!

Show-and-Tell attached (I think).

Dang! they were actually dumb enough to show up at the Tot with it so soon after stealing it.

This is good to hear.

Sweet!!

Accused had rented the boat from the Moore's and then came back to get it during the highwater evac drill the Moore's were going thru that day due to the sudden 10+ rise in the river.

Accused lives in New Blaine. Crime committed in one county, apprehension is in another, and thief lives in a third. Kerry thinks the case will end up in his county where the crime was committed.

I only use the word "accused" to keep this civil.

You may or may not know that I cannot staaaaaaaand thieves. They got the come-upins!
Glad all is well again!

glad it was found, justice was served. I was at turner bend yesterday and they told me someone stole a yellow buffalo canoe from them.

May they forever be caught in the suckhole. Shoulda sent them over the falls without paddles OR boat. Probly good I wasn't there. Backwoods justice is the best most real and timely justice

suckhole wrote:May they forever be caught in the suckhole. Shoulda sent them over the falls without paddles OR boat. Probly good I wasn't there. Backwoods justice is the best most real and timely justice

Thanks Monsoon. Don't mean to offend, but I've been to places that had a very low theft rate. Mostly because he would have been led to an arena where the removal of his hand would be broadcast on tv. When word got around that a guy was drug out of the tot after his "untimely run down the falls" that left him bruised and battered(kinda like my bmf run last weekend)in a stolen boat, I bet the frequency of these occurrences would plummitt. I'm just sayin'.........

Knowing Kerry, it's probably a good thing he wasn't around. Glad the raft is back in their hands.

I'm trying to figure how to tell the parts of the story I know, without posting something that might present "opportunities" for a defense attorney to use in some legal argument. Much of this will be told around future campfires, I'm sure.

We do know that the men in the raft seemed "out of place". They had a nice raft, but their other gear didn't fit the picture. Like one seat cushion, tied to a rope, and no lifejackets, even though we now have billboards all over our state, and even signs and brochures posted in the Falls campground where they were camped, making the law well known to the boating public.

We know that when questioned by the authorities, some details of their story didn't match known facts. As to the specifics, that's the kind of stuff I'm not going to post here.

We don't know, did they really purchase the raft from someone? Were they all equally involved, or were some of the friends unaware of what their buddies might have done? The courts and further investigation will have to sort out those details; thank your lucky stars you live in a country where that is the process.

We know that the raft had specific, distinguishing marks which were known to the original owner. We know that the serial number was missing, which is highly unlikely unless it had been intentionally torn off. That doesn't prove that these guys did that, only that the person who originally took the raft understood he was stealing it, not borrowing with intention of returning.

And we can applaud the professionalism of the Cossatot rangers who responded; they did not jump to conclusions based on hear-say. They asked questions like "Do you personally know the rafts original owner?", "how sure are you that ...." etc. As Lupe said on another thread, I'm sure it helped that they recognized faces of folks who had worked with them before in both flatwater and swiftwater training sessions, but they stayed professional and didn't just take our word over some strangers’ version of events. And they worked to contact the Moore’s (with some help from us on phone numbers, I think..) as the events were unfolding. Yes, there were some discussions centering on the options that our sheer numbers gave us, but we could not have resolved it as cleanly and decisively as these rangers did, because we would have lacked the legal authority to act in such a manner.

Aw heck, this is a message board, so I'll say it this way:

ACC:
Non-club member “we’re all friends on the river” boaters:
Cossatot Rangers: