POLICEBEAT

Police Beat

By Joseph Altman Jr.
Arizona Daily Wildcat

An employee at the Ina E. Gittings building, 1713 E. University Blvd., reported receiving eight harassing phone calls in a half-hour period Thursday.
The employee said during each call between 10 and 10:30 a.m., a male said, "I want to fuck you." The caller did not identify himself.
The employee attempted to trace the calls by pressing *57, but she was informed that the calls were not traced because they were made from off campus. Police suggested that the employee log any other calls she receives.

An employee in the Gould-Simpson building, 1040 E. Fourth St., was found lying in a stairwell bleeding from his head Thursday morning.
At 8:33 a.m., police arrived and found the man between the fifth and sixth floors of the southwest stairwell. Another male was applying pressure to stop bleeding from a cut on the employee's head. A large amount of blood was already on the floor.
The Tucson Fire Department arrived and transported the employee to University Medical Center.

A Tucson man was arrested early Thursday morning after he was stopped for speeding and then allegedly assaulted a police officer attempting to put him in a patrol car.
Ernesto A. Ortiz, 44, of the 2100 block of East Seventh Street, was arrested and eventually charged with driving under the influence, aggravated assault on a peace officer and criminal speeding.
Police stopped Ortiz at 1:24 a.m. after observing him travelling westbound on East Speedway Boulevard at a high rate of speed. Police paced Ortiz's vehicle at 69 mph along Speedway, where the legal limit is 35.
When the car stopped at Speedway and North Fifth Avenue, Ortiz's wife, who was a passenger in the vehicle, began answering the officer's questions for her husband. Ortiz then told the officer he had two beers and then exited the vehicle.
When police asked Ortiz to perform field sobriety tests, the wife yelled out, "Ernesto, say no!" The officer asked the wife not to get involved, however, Ortiz refused to submit to the tests.
The officer then arrested Ortiz for DUI while another officer arrived to assist. Ortiz then became very hostile and tensed up as the officers tried to get Ortiz to sit in the police car.
According to police reports Ortiz would not enter the car. Instead, he yelled obscenities at the officers and kicked one of them in the thigh area, police reports stated.
Ortiz was transported to the University of Arizona police station but would not exit the car, so officers transported him directly to Pima County Jail.

Two students were arrested at Babcock Apartments, 1717 E. Speedway Blvd., after an officer on foot patrol noticed the smell of marijuana coming from one of the rooms.
Michael A. Thompson, 18, and Sean M. Perrotti, 19, both Babcock residents, were arrested after police investigated the odor.
When the officer knocked on the door to the room, the occupants were heard whispering and looking out of the peep hole before the door was opened and the smell of marijuana became stronger.
The residents allowed the officer into the room, where an aluminum scale and small pieces of what was believed to be marijuana were found on a table. Four males were in the room.
The officer was about to allow Perrotti to leave when he noticed him attempt to conceal something in his waistband. The officer searched Perrotti and found a baggie containing a "green, plant-like substance" in his pants.
Thompson then gave officers permission to search his side of the room, saying there was no marijuana in the room. Police, however, found a baggie containing a "substantial" amount of marijuana behind a small refrigerator.
Thompson told the officers he purchased the marijuana from "a guy on Sixth Street." Perrotti said he purchased his baggie of marijuana from Thompson.
Thompson was taken to Pima County Jail and charged with possession of marijuana for sale and possession of narcotic paraphernalia. Perrotti was cited for possession of marijuana and released at the scene. Both baggies of marijuana and the scale were taken into evidence.

Police Beat is compiled from official University of Arizona Police Department reports.