Adele Paslow thought she had a good relationship with police.
The owner of the Soap Box Inc. laundromat in Knoxville would regularly forward tips and provide high-quality footage from the video surveillance system on her building on Brownsville Road. Last year Pittsburgh's deputy police chief sent a letter praising her help and vigilance.
So when Ms. Paslow called 911 on Saturday, Aug. 11 to report a group of juveniles throwing rocks at her expensive cameras in an alley behind the laundromat, she expected the police would come to her aid.
Instead, they arrested her.
When officers arrived, they found Ms. Paslow and the youths in the alley. Knowing that she was a licensed gun owner, police confiscated her firearm from where it was hidden under her shirt. Then they took her into custody and let the juveniles go.
Police filed 13 charges against Ms. Paslow, 56, of Bethel Park, including four felonies. They accused her of threatening the boys with her gun and illegally detaining them.
Ms. Paslow, who denies the allegations and said she had never before been arrested, claims she was not given a phone call and was held at the Allegheny County Jail for 16 hours, unable to tell her husband and sister what happened. She is scheduled for a preliminary hearing Wednesday in City Court.
“I’m not a bad guy,” Ms. Paslow said. “I’m one of the good guys."
As officers handcuffed her, she said she begged them repeatedly to review the video from her cameras. But they didn’t. She said they told her: “Save it for your trial.”
Their refusal has raised the ire of Allegheny County District Attorney Stephen A. Zappala Jr., who said Friday that the officers should have watched the video. It is not the first time the DA has criticized Pittsburgh police for failing to investigate prior to making an arrest.
“When the police are made aware that video is available, they should obtain it,” Mr. Zappala said. “If somebody has an alibi, you should look at it and review it before you file charges.”
Now, though, Ms. Paslow is worried that the video will not clear her. A crucial 90 seconds of footage, which she said would have shown her initial confrontation with the juveniles and refute the police version of events, is gone. She blamed the missing footage on glitches in the cameras that she said began when they were struck with rocks.
Had the arresting officers done their jobs properly and taken five extra minutes to investigate, Ms. Paslow said, they could have watched the video then. She said it would have shown she never pulled her gun.
“It would have exonerated me,” she said.
’Oh my God’
Ms. Paslow and her sister, Celeste Robison, who co-own the business with their brother, have called police to report illegal dumping behind their building, wanted suspects walking by, shootings and drugs. Ms. Paslow said they often turn over video to assist investigations.
On Aug. 11, Ms. Paslow was at the laundromat to review video evidence of a recent crime. She’d already provided investigators footage of the incident itself, but she was curious whether there were any other helpful images.
As she waited for it to upload, Ms. Paslow said she heard a loud banging from the back of the building. She turned on the live feed from the security cameras and saw a group of juveniles throwing rocks.
“I see these kids just pummeling my cameras,” she said. “You can see the rocks coming right to the lens of the camera.”
The video taken from the “garage door camera” shows four boys picking up rocks from the street and throwing them starting at 7:15 p.m.
At 7:29 p.m. Ms. Paslow called 911. She said she didn’t intend to go confront the group; she just wanted them to stop.
But then she moved the video feed to a little earlier.
“The first thing I click on is a kid with a gun running at another kid.” She said to herself, “Oh my God.”
The video shows eight juveniles in the alley. One boy has a silver, semi-automatic handgun and charges at several girls. He is stopped by another boy, who takes the gun away and removes the magazine. The gun is then handled by two girls before it is finally handed back to the second boy, who tucks it in his waist band and covers it with his shirt.
As she continued to watch, Ms. Paslow said, the live feed showed that the rocks were getting bigger, striking the cameras and causing them to bounce against the walls.
She called 911 again and told the dispatcher she was going to “chase them away.” Ms. Paslow said she didn’t think they’d ever use the gun, so she wasn’t afraid.
Ms. Paslow also asked the call-taker to inform responding officers that she had a permit to carry a concealed firearm that she wore in a holster under her shirt. But she said she didn’t mention the gun she saw on the video because she wasn’t sure the juveniles would still have it when police arrived and didn’t want to accuse them if they didn’t.
Two versions
The video from inside the laundromat shows Ms. Paslow walk out the front door at 7:30 p.m. The next camera view shows her 90 seconds later standing in front of the boys with her cell phone in her left hand. She is using her right hand to point at them.
There is no audio, but it appears she’s lecturing them.
“When I get back there, three of those boys are sitting and one was standing. I told him to take a seat, and police are coming,” Ms. Paslow said.
The boys did as told.
Ms. Paslow called 911 a third time. She told the call-taker that the kids were detained and not going anywhere. At 7:38 p.m., nine minutes after her first call, Ms. Paslow can be seen in the video flagging down the responding officers.
The video shows two of them talking to her and then a third officer appears. He would soon disarm her, taking her gun, holster and permit to carry.
As they arrested her, Ms. Paslow said she urged the officers to go to the laundromat to watch the stream from her surveillance system.
They refused, and instead charged her with four counts each of unlawful restraint, terroristic threats and simple assault, as well as possessing an instrument of crime — her handgun.
According to the criminal complaint, the juveniles told officers that Ms. Paslow “approached them and told them ‘not to move’ or ‘I will kill you.’ They stated that Paslow then pulled up her shirt, unbuttoned her holster and placed her hand on the handle of the firearm while partially removing it from the holster. All four juveniles were visibly shaken and upset over the experience.”
The complaint does not name the juveniles.
Officer Richard Dilimone also wrote in the affidavit that Ms. Paslow’s holster was "very good" at concealing her weapon, and that he could not tell she had it.
“I do not believe that these four juveniles would have been able to recognize that Paslow had a weapon unless, as they claimed, she made the firearm known to them.”
But Ms. Paslow said the four boys who had been throwing rocks at her cameras, including the two who had the gun earlier, watched as the officer lifted Ms. Paslow’s shirt and disarmed her. The video shows that happening in front of the area where the children were located.
“They asked me right in front of the kids, ‘Where’s your gun?’” Ms. Paslow said.
Ms. Paslow said she never threatened the boys or pulled up her shirt, or ever even touched her firearm.
But her story can’t be verified by the video camera system because of the missing 90 seconds of footage.
Ms. Robison, who said she does not normally use the camera system, went to look at the video about 7 a.m. Aug. 12, hoping that it would show her what happened.
She downloaded the footage from various cameras trying to piece the events together. She said that after the cameras were pelted with the rocks, random 10-20-minute periods of footage would go missing.
Under review
Ms. Paslow was scheduled to appear for a preliminary hearing on Aug. 22, but the case was postponed.
She said she asked the assistant district attorney at the courthouse, “Will you review some video that exonerates me?”
The prosecutor asked her her name, she recalled, pulled her file, read it quickly, and declined to speak to her without her attorney.
First Assistant District Attorney Rebecca Spangler said Thursday that she is not surprised.
“At that point in time, we wouldn’t want to violate an unrepresented person’s rights,” she said. “When someone’s facing felony charges, we have an obligation to protect their right to counsel.”
Ms. Spangler said that she is reviewing Ms. Paslow's case with Pittsburgh police Deputy Chief Thomas Stangrecki, who wrote the Oct. 10, 2017, letter thanking Ms. Paslow for her help.
Chris Togneri, a police spokesman, said he could not comment on a pending investigation but did confirm that the juveniles were not charged because officers did not see any damage to the cameras. It is unclear if officers ever recovered the handgun the boys had.
Meanwhile Ms. Paslow awaits her Wednesday court hearing.
“I never thought you got arrested as a victim," Ms. Paslow said, "but I am, clearly, very wrong.”
Paula Reed Ward: pward@post-gazette.com, 412-263-2620 or on Twitter: @PaulaReedWard.
First Published: September 2, 2018, 4:27 a.m.
