Drug-Addled Man Had Cocked, Loaded Pistol at Side

A paranoid drug addict with a dangerous mix of stimulants and narcotics in his system triggered a tense situation for police in the early hours Sunday when he yelled that he had a gun in his car.

At 2:27 a.m., the 32-year-old Wauwatosa man was arrested for driving while under the influence of drugs, endangering safety, carrying a concealed weapon and possession of a gun in a school zone.

According to the police report:

Police had been called about midnight by the man’s parents, who said their son had been calling them all evening to warn them about some danger that he and they were supposedly in. They asked for extra patrols of the neighborhood around their home in the 2600 block of North 111th Street.

At 2:17 a.m., the father called police again to report a suspicious vehicle circling the block. An officer responded, spotted the vehicle parked and facing toward him, and he turned on his emergency lights.

The driver at first began to drive away, so the officer blocked him with his squad car. Then the man began waving his hands out the window and shouting things like, “He’s over there!” and “I’m the one who called you!” and “They’re after me!”

Then he yelled that he had a gun in the car, prompting the officer to call in support for a felony traffic stop ­– going in with guns drawn. The man was arrested and taken away without resistance, after which the first officer called to the scene examined his car.

In plain view on the front passenger seat was a cocked 9mm semiautomatic pistol with a round in the chamber and the magazine half-ejected.

Under questioning, the man, who lives with his uncle in the same block, was erratic and paranoid, according to police, and seemed to think that his girlfriend was cheating on him and conspiring with someone to harm him.

He said that at the time he was stopped, he was trying to spot someone he knew was hiding in the bushes near his parents' home, and he had the gun at the ready in case there was a confrontation.

No other subjects were seen or reported in the area.

He also told officers that he had started to remove the handgun's magazine when he realized he was being stopped by police.

Officers suspected the man, whose parents had told them had long been addicted to narcotics including heroin, was under the influence at the time and took him to Wisconsin Heart Hospital for a blood draw. An officer who is a certified drug recognition expert also examined him and determined that he was under the influence of both stimulants and narcotics.

The man said that he had a large collection of guns in his uncle’s basement and that he had bought the 9mm semiautomatic from a cook at a restaurant. The arrest occurred about 500 feet from Whitman Middle School, leading to the school zone charge.