So I sent a man to jail last night.

[Noodleboy13]

He asked me to.
I was outside a bar after close, talking to some friends when this guy stumbles out. Drunk, probably smoked something that incapacitated him. Legs shaking, the whole bit. The best we could get out of him was that his friends had ditched him, had no money, credit card, etc. Lived in a first ring suburb. We told him that if we called the cops he was gonna spend a day or two in detox, but he was fairly insistent.
Couldn't let him freeze (this is in Mpls) so I called 911.

hope he's alright.

peace,
Noodleboy

[CaliforniaPeggy]

1. He knew what he needed...

He just needed you to help him do it.

I hope he's OK too.

[Justice wanted]

2. Very interesting he insisted you call the cops.

[superpatriotman]

3. Did the bar he drank in share any responsibility

to maybe get him a cab?

I'm sure his money was green enough throughout the evening.

[Noodleboy13]

6. He didn't actually seem that super drunk.

Wasn't slurring, etc. I think the culprit was something that he either smoked or ingested that caused a multiplier effect.
I was wondering what kind of friends he has that just left him alone.

peace,
Noodleboy

[slackmaster]

4. He sent himself to jail

You helped.

[safeinOhio]

5. 3 hots and a cot. n/t

[era veteran]

7. We have a famous town drunk in Lexington

I have had him locked up in 5 different decades. He is my friend and I feed him regularly. Jail is warm and dry.
Homeless and the drunkards, a tide across town, the new Armies of the Night.

[Warpy]

8. He will be more all right in the drunk tank

than he would have been on the street.

You did a good thing and he probably knows it if he remembers anything at all about last night.

[Keystone Writer]

9. Was his name Otis?

[pinboy3niner]

12. I dunno, but the cop who showed up had his bullet in his pocket :)

[Rose Siding]

14. Right Otis: Sheriff Taylor made Deputy Fife carry his bullet in his pocket

...because he kept accidentally discharging his weapon!

[Noodleboy13]

10. 11 years ago, I didn't do something, and they died.

Looked out my window, saw some guy sprawled, obviously drunk on a bus stop bench across the street. Thought to myself "Hey, not my problem, he'll get picked up soon enough." Noticed flashing lights about an hour later and watched EMT's loading his shrouded body into the back of an ambulance. Had I called 911, he might still be alive.
I still feel really shitty about myself when I think of that.

peace,
Noodleboy

[renate]

11. it's a really tough call

He was at a bus stop, apparently waiting for a bus to take him home or wherever he was going. In other words, he seemed to have a plan. And if you'd called 911 and he'd been just an average drunk guy who wasn't close to death, he might have gotten stuck with a huge ambulance bill for nothing more than inebriation. You certainly had no way whatsoever of knowing how dire his situation was.

He was there because of choices he made; it wasn't your responsibility to look out the window and spot him, and it wasn't your responsibility to guess whether he actually needed emergency care or whether he'd have gone into a spiral of debt because of an unnecessary ambulance bill. (And before you had the benefit of hindsight, it sure looked like he would be better off without the ambulance than with it.) Also, if he was in such terrible medical condition that he was that close to death simply from getting drunk, he probably didn't have long to live anyway, or he would have gotten drunk again alone and would have died in an even more depressing circumstance.

I'm not saying I wouldn't feel the same way in your situation, I have to admit, because guilt isn't always logical. But even if it's true that he'd have lived (for the moment, anyway) if you'd called the ambulance instead of figuring that he'd be picked up soon enough, his death certainly wasn't your fault.