Gotcha!
Tony Snesko
Lemon Grove, California
In 1973, I was given a Court Order for Appearance to be served on a man in southern California. It was obvious from the first attempt that this man would never voluntarily make himself available for service. On each attempt, his wife would give me a “Cheshire cat” grin and say, “He’s not home and I don’t know when he will be.” Then, with a half wink, and a glance over her shoulder, she let me know that he really was there and there was no way I was ever going to serve him. Over a two-month period I had made, at least, 40 attempts even though the client was only paying $7.20 and I was only getting paid 60% of that.
Our client was a collection attorney and never authorized stake-out time. However, I took it personally when people avoided service and I often staked out services at no charge to my clients. I had staked out this house for a minimum of ten hours over two months and was beginning to believe that this man never left his house. Then one day, after going through the same drill with his wife, I stepped off of their porch and noticed that their trash cans were sitting out by the curb. They normally were stored twenty feet back from the curb next to the neighbor’s cinderblock wall. ‘DUH!!’ I thought, ‘Why didn’t I notice that before?’ Someone had to take those cans to the curb and I could only hope that it would be her husband.
The next week, I went by their house late in the evening, the day before their trash was to be picked up to insure that the trash hadn’t been taken out yet. The next morning at 4:00 am, I was sitting in the neighbors yard behind the wall and next to the trash cans. At 5:30 am I heard the a back door creak and I peeked over the wall. It was almost dawn as I noticed the garage door had opened slightly and a man’s head peeked out and looked up and down the street. He then flung the garage door opened and ran directly toward me with his arms holding two paper bags full of trash. He was so focused on searching the street for anything out of the ordinary, he didn’t notice me stand up. By the time he reached the trash cans, my hand was extended with the Court Order hanging from my fingers just inches from his ear. You can only imagine the look on his face when I announced my presence.
It seemed as though his body levitated for a few seconds as the bags of trash went into orbit and he streaked back to the garage. I was laughing uncontrollably as I knocked on the front door. When his wife answered, it was my turn to give the Cheshire cat grin. “Ma’am,” I said, quite full of myself. “Your husband left a Court Order laying on the ground by the trash.” She slammed the door and I skipped gleefully back to my car.