By LEAH WEATHERSBY

Possessed by marijuana:

On Jan. 17 at about 1:30 a.m., police officers were dispatched to investigate calls from several U-District residents saying someone was throwing rocks at their windows. Upon their arrival, the police were met by several tenants from a local apartment building who had been awoken by the disturbance. They said they had seen a group of men standing on a third-floor balcony, hurling items over the side including road flares and fireworks.

The police went up to the apartment to check things out and noticed a strong odor of marijuana and loud voices even before reaching the door. The smell grew stronger as the door opened to reveal four men in their early 20s and a coffee table on which was placed a baggy of green vegetable matter and a recently used blue-and-while pipe. Two of the boys had pillows duck-taped to their hands, explaining that they had recently been engaged in a boxing match. When asked why they thought the police were there, one of the pillow-handed fellows said," because we were throwing ice." He added that the group had thrown a road flare, but denied that they'd had any fireworks.

Grumpy old men:

On Jan. 20, police responded to a report of an assault at a Ravenna retirement home. The victim, a male, said that the ex-girlfriend of one the home's other residents had approached him that morning because her former beau wouldn't leave her alone. She asked the man if he would speak to the harasser on her behalf. However, when the man did approach the ex-boyfriend (a fellow in his 60s), he was ignored. After that, the ex-boyfriend began following the man around, staring and cursing at him.

The man said that at about 7:30 p.m. the ex-boyfriend, who has by this time intoxicated, approached him with a wooden 2-by-4 and hit him in the hand, causing him to fall over and break a chair. When the man tried to stand up, the ex-boyfriend threatened to hit him a second time.

The ex-boyfriend, who had intoxicants on his breath, told police that the other man had made fun of his voice because he was deaf and denied any knowledge of a 2-by-4.

Tenants get snippy over hair salon:

On Jan. 19, police responded to reports of locks being illegally changed at a Broadview hair salon. The lease-holder, a woman in her 50s, sublet some of the space inside the shop to two hair stylists, a man and a woman. The lease-holder had advised her tenants that the rent was increasing, but so far they had only mailed checks in the old amount. She informed them that they would have to out by the end of the month.

When the lease-holder arrived at the salon on Jan. 19, she discovered that the locks had been changed. She promptly returned with a locksmith and the police. The officers went into shop to talk to the two stylists, they found them on the phone with their lawyer and ready to ignore both the police and the customer who was stranded in the barber's chair.

The officers tried to explain that it was illegal for the two tenants to change to locks without permission, but to no avail.

Finally, in the hope of better communication with the two stylists, one of the officers agreed to speak to the lawyer, however that too proved fruitless. The lawyer told the police that both they and the lease-holder were trespassing and demanded that they leave the premises immediately.

The officer explained that they were responding to a 911 call and that in any case they were in a business that was open to the public but could not make the lawyer see his point of view either. The locksmith was finally able to make the lease-holder a copy of the key to the new lock and they left without further incident. The police requested that charges of harassment of retaliation be filed against the two stylists.

Suspected shoplifter nabbed:

On the evening of Jan. 20, a Greenwood store manager (a woman in her 20s) spotted a man she suspected of having previously committed acts of shoplifting standing at a check-out counter buying some tobacco. She noticed that the suspect, a man in his 40s, appeared to have several items from the store stuffed in his jacket pockets. She followed him out of the store to a nearby bus stop where she demanded that he hand over his stolen loot.

The suspect didn't say anything, but as he stood up a wrist-watch from the store fell out of his pockets. The manager picked up the watch and asked again for the other items. "Well, at least you got that back," the suspect replied, before proceeding to walk down Greenwood Avenue.

A short while later, a clerk at another Greenwood store called 911 to report a disturbance, coincidentally being caused by the suspect, who had apparently decided to continue his crime spree in the neighborhood. The police brought the him back to the first store, where the manager was able to identify both him and the contents of his jacket pockets.