Do NOT Feed the Wildlife!

I was going to post this wild-and-crazy dream I had early last week about being taken hostage by the infamous Bucky Phillips and collecting the reward for helping the police capture him.
It seemed funny at the time, and naturally I blame the whole thing on falling asleep that particular night to the chatter on the police scanner (occupational hazard) as another Bucky alert was being called out.

At first, the random scanner broadcasts had me on high-alerts, guessing troopers would catch him as we listened. But then, I confess it devolved into something of a mild amusement because the guy has been on the run the entire summer, and with each successive broadcast over the scanner they seemed thisclose to catching him and somehow he still got away.

But it's not funny anymore.

Somehow, the ever-increasing danger associated with each alert, the fact that he went from being "armed and dangerous" to "armed and extremely dangerous" had just been lost in the repetition of it all. Well, all that changed when I got back in town on Labor Day only to learn that, early over the weekend, this escaped prisoner had ambushed two troopers with one of the high-powered rifles he was believed to have stolen the night the latest alert prompted my stupid dream. One of the officers died of his injuries. He was only 32, and he left a wife and child behind.

Now I'm nowhere close to amused; I'm angry.

See, there's been a bunch of local yahoos down Southern Tier way that have reportedly been aiding and abetting this particular fugitive. I'm sure they would swear they haven't actually helped him, but I daresay hawking "Got Bucky?" t-shirts and eating so-called Bucky burgers is going to go a long way toward turning the suspect into some warped version of a local folk hero. That makes it a lot harder for the police to reinforce the image of what this man truly is: a murderer and thief on the run from justice.

The yahoos helped create the very environment in which a few dim-wits have gone so far as to literally assist Bucky in eluding capture, reportedly by leaving him food, supplies, and likely unlocked backwoods cabins etc. to hole up in. It eerily echoes one particular episode of "Numb3rs" from last season where a small town turned tracking a fugitive into a near-cottage industry. Reportedly, the weekend shootings were "retaliation" against troopers who dared to intercept and interrupt relatives and/or others believed to be giving Bucky a helping hand.

People! Have you learned NOTHING from shows like "Wild America" or even "Dateline?"
Do NOT feed the wildlife! (Or in this case, the Wild Man.) Bears, mountain lions and other wild animals, even raccoons, cannot be domesticated. They cannot be placated. And letting them help themselves to scraps, garbage or what-have-you is only asking for trouble in the long run. Because pretty soon, the garbage and the scraps cease to satisfy them, and before you know it, it's like they've taken over. They come right up on front porches or break through screen doors to help themselves to whatever's in the refrigerator ... or the baby bassinette. And then a whole town is held hostage by the beasts.

So no one should be surprised that kids in Chautaqua County schools are spending recess inside, that motorists are being delayed at checkpoints, that hunters may be facing cancellation of the shooting season. Such is life when a suspected murderer is on the lam in one's own backyard.

If the yahoos don't like living under such restrictions, they ought to consider burning those t-shirts and calling for the man's capture instead. I'm not kidding.

Clearly, neither is Bucky Phillips.