Everyone was all a-Twitter on Friday because of the news that a runaway deer was going crazy downtown, smashing in to buildings and then dying, appropriately enough, on Memorial Drive. It turns out that the deer came in to the city from his West County home, and then quickly became frustrated with the traffic and parking, before getting mugged and then freaked out when the random guard at the Metrolink entrance wouldn’t let him down the stairs because he didn’t have a ticket. “What? You buy tickets down there!” said the deer, but it was in a deer’s voice, so we’re not sure if he effectively made his point. That’s when he smashed in to the building in a rage and died.
The deer leaves behind a family out in Ballwin, who live in a big house that never gets robbed, and they’re right next to a Costco. It’s really sweet.
…actually the deer didn’t really “leave” anyone behind, because some 24 hours after being drug on to the sidewalk by St. Louis’ finest the deer was still there, turing in to deer jerky on the street. The deer remains were finally re-discovered by authorities the next day, when the police noticed it while investigating an “unrelated shooting”…no, we’re not joking. That actually happened. This is how St. Louis works: We clean up the previous mess while investigating the next one.
The deer had charged through the glass lobby door of an office building at 555 Washington Avenue about 1:40 p.m. Friday, then darted through the Mansion House parking garage. It was soon found dead along Memorial Drive.
Police arrived that afternoon and moved the carcass off the road to a gravel patch along a sidewalk of Memorial Drive.
Then, despite media reports of the deer’s demise, its body lay there until the next afternoon, when police came back to investigate an unrelated shooting on the same block.
“OK, what is this deer doing in my crime scene?” St. Louis Police Lt. Janice Bockstruck said when she found the deer still there.
Here’s our top 5 list of guesses why no one got the deer:
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“We can’t just pick up every body that looks dead on the streets Friday night! …sometimes it’s only a flesh wound and they can still make it home later.”
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“It was kinda chilly for June that night. We thought someone might want to sleep inside of it for warmth.”
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“We had to fire everyone in that department to book Heart for Fair St. Louis this year.”
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“Oh so now the homeless are too good to eat a dead deer?! Damn you Larry Rice!”
1. “We’ll get to it when we get to it. It’s downtown! Who’s gonna notice?”
Here’s the actual reason:
“Nobody received any notification,” [Sam Dotson, St. Louis’ director of operations] said. “If that had been the case, of course we would have gone to respond to it.”
“How didn’t we know?” [Todd Waelterman, director of the city streets department] said. “That just amazes me.”
Well that’s horrible. No one told anyone to come pick up the deer?! Just think how long it would have sat there if that guy wouldn’t have shot that other guy! Freaking city’s full of people that won’t even take a second to check to see who’s supposed to come for the deer, but one man knew there was a problem and took action to get people’s attention. He only had the city, the respect for that beautiful dead creature…and that guy that he totally wanted to kill…in his sights. Thank you citizen! What would we have done without you?
via STLToday (+ photo credit)
Bonus coverage from friend of the site “Fake Mayor Slay”: