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All right, I've been lurking on the boards for a while, a-posting here and there. But this is my first story to tell. (I'm glad it's in this board!)
As some of you may have gleaned from some of my posts, I am the head of Security for a few conventions in Wisconsin, and work security for a large anime convention around Chicago. A couple weeks ago my team and I worked a convention in Wisconsin that, over the past years, has gained a reputation among us for being the convention where nothing ever goes wrong.
It's about 2am, Saturday night (although I suppose, if you wanted to, you could consider it Sunday by then) of the con, and we've only thrown 2 people out of the hotel. All in all, things are going pretty well. I've just started jamming out Rock Band-style with some off-shift security people - the first real time I've taken for myself all con. I'm 16 bars of rockin' bass into Lady Gaga's Poker Face and one of my security ops comes running up, pointing to her headset.
Her (over the music): "You've got a radio call!"
Me: "Is it important?"
Her: "It's the head of Hotel Security. He wants you in the atrium, stat."
Ah, crap. Well, I hand my bass to someone else and run out of the room to the atrium (on the other side of the hotel). The head of Hotel Security (we'll call him "Bob") shows me two teenagers and tells me his guys caught them dropping pennies at people off the indoor balcony... nine stories up. Ouch. We go over and get their information, and then Bob tells them that dropping things from the balconies is an immediate ejection from the hotel. I ask for their badges, it's also an immediate ejection from the convention. They seem to understand, and don't make a big fuss about it, but they're crying and obviously remorseful over it.
Then Bob asks if there's anyone who can pick them up. The boy whips out his cell phone, calls his mom, explains the situation. She's obviously not happy with him, but she's coming for him. But then the girl explains that she doesn't live anywhere near the boy, and I accompany her up to her room to get her cell phone. She calls her mom's cell, but she is hard of hearing and isn't woken up by it. She tries calling friends in the area (for a wide definition of "in the area") but no-one is answering. She calls her (grown-up) brother, and immediately sparks start to fly.
For five or ten whole minutes, she sits there, tears streaming down her face, as her brother dresses her down over the phone for getting kicked out of the hotel. Finally, he tells her that he's not gonna come pick her up and she gets to fend for herself. At this point, she has no-one left to call, so the only people we can release her to are the local police.
This is not a great idea. Not only is it a disproportionate response, but this girl obviously doesn't need to spend a night in a jail cell to learn her lesson after this. Bob is hemming and hawing about the situation. He hasn't called the cops to take her away yet, and he really doesn't want to. Finally, he asks the girl for her brother's number. She gets even more scared, but, after asking for it a few times, she gives it to him. Bob walks away, and I'm left sitting there with her, trying to get her to calm down a little bit.
About ten minutes later, Bob comes back and tells the girl that she can stay the night in the hotel. I still have to take her badge, but at least now she has somewhere to sleep that night that doesn't have bars on it. Since it's obvious that this girl is not coming from the best family situation, I'm almost as relieved as she is that she doesn't have to face going back to her family after getting kicked out of a hotel for something as stupid as dropping some coins near some people.
Bob tells me later that he's only done this kind of thing once before - years and years ago - but that he saw that there were "some issues at home" and he thought it would just be plain wrong to throw her to the wolves or hand her over to the cops. He said, "Well, I'll catch hell for it from my boss in the morning, when I turn in my report, but that's all right. I'll take the brunt." And that ten minute break he took after taking the brother's number? Turns out he called him and told him exactly what he thought about the brother's attitude toward his sister and his unwillingness to do the right thing and help out his sister when she needed support, not to get yelled at.
I am definitely looking forward to working with this guy again next year. He is, without a doubt, the best hotel security guy I've ever worked with, and I've got a good bit of backlog to compare him against.
As some of you may have gleaned from some of my posts, I am the head of Security for a few conventions in Wisconsin, and work security for a large anime convention around Chicago. A couple weeks ago my team and I worked a convention in Wisconsin that, over the past years, has gained a reputation among us for being the convention where nothing ever goes wrong.
It's about 2am, Saturday night (although I suppose, if you wanted to, you could consider it Sunday by then) of the con, and we've only thrown 2 people out of the hotel. All in all, things are going pretty well. I've just started jamming out Rock Band-style with some off-shift security people - the first real time I've taken for myself all con. I'm 16 bars of rockin' bass into Lady Gaga's Poker Face and one of my security ops comes running up, pointing to her headset.
Her (over the music): "You've got a radio call!"
Me: "Is it important?"
Her: "It's the head of Hotel Security. He wants you in the atrium, stat."
Ah, crap. Well, I hand my bass to someone else and run out of the room to the atrium (on the other side of the hotel). The head of Hotel Security (we'll call him "Bob") shows me two teenagers and tells me his guys caught them dropping pennies at people off the indoor balcony... nine stories up. Ouch. We go over and get their information, and then Bob tells them that dropping things from the balconies is an immediate ejection from the hotel. I ask for their badges, it's also an immediate ejection from the convention. They seem to understand, and don't make a big fuss about it, but they're crying and obviously remorseful over it.
Then Bob asks if there's anyone who can pick them up. The boy whips out his cell phone, calls his mom, explains the situation. She's obviously not happy with him, but she's coming for him. But then the girl explains that she doesn't live anywhere near the boy, and I accompany her up to her room to get her cell phone. She calls her mom's cell, but she is hard of hearing and isn't woken up by it. She tries calling friends in the area (for a wide definition of "in the area") but no-one is answering. She calls her (grown-up) brother, and immediately sparks start to fly.
For five or ten whole minutes, she sits there, tears streaming down her face, as her brother dresses her down over the phone for getting kicked out of the hotel. Finally, he tells her that he's not gonna come pick her up and she gets to fend for herself. At this point, she has no-one left to call, so the only people we can release her to are the local police.
This is not a great idea. Not only is it a disproportionate response, but this girl obviously doesn't need to spend a night in a jail cell to learn her lesson after this. Bob is hemming and hawing about the situation. He hasn't called the cops to take her away yet, and he really doesn't want to. Finally, he asks the girl for her brother's number. She gets even more scared, but, after asking for it a few times, she gives it to him. Bob walks away, and I'm left sitting there with her, trying to get her to calm down a little bit.
About ten minutes later, Bob comes back and tells the girl that she can stay the night in the hotel. I still have to take her badge, but at least now she has somewhere to sleep that night that doesn't have bars on it. Since it's obvious that this girl is not coming from the best family situation, I'm almost as relieved as she is that she doesn't have to face going back to her family after getting kicked out of a hotel for something as stupid as dropping some coins near some people.
Bob tells me later that he's only done this kind of thing once before - years and years ago - but that he saw that there were "some issues at home" and he thought it would just be plain wrong to throw her to the wolves or hand her over to the cops. He said, "Well, I'll catch hell for it from my boss in the morning, when I turn in my report, but that's all right. I'll take the brunt." And that ten minute break he took after taking the brother's number? Turns out he called him and told him exactly what he thought about the brother's attitude toward his sister and his unwillingness to do the right thing and help out his sister when she needed support, not to get yelled at.
I am definitely looking forward to working with this guy again next year. He is, without a doubt, the best hotel security guy I've ever worked with, and I've got a good bit of backlog to compare him against.
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