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Homeless man charges his phone in the park and gets busted

By Alan Friedman

Published: Nov 16, 2012, 7:49 AM

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Homeless man charges his phone in the park and gets busted

The outlet used by Kersey to charge his phone

Darren Kersey, 28, is homeless. But last Sunday, Kersey had a home for the night-a jail in Sarasota. He wound up at that location when he was spotted by Sarasota Police Sgt. Anthony Frangioni charging his cellphone at a public picnic shelter at the city's Gillespie Park. In his report, Sgt. Frangioni, who has put in 14 years with the Sarasota Police Department wrote "theft of city utilities will not be tolerated during this bad economy." He also admonished the man and told him to charge his phone at local shelters.

While it is not known what model phone Kersey has, it only takes all of 41 cents in electricity to charge an Apple iPhone for a year. It costs many times that figure to house a man in jail for a night and prosecute him. While that makes all the sense in the world, the judge threw out the case on Monday morning for a different reason saying that the office had no justification to make the arrest in the first place.

By Monday morning, there were eight homeless people in the park, including two who were charging their phones in the same location where Kersey was arrested. We guess that John Lennon had it right when he sang "Power to the People".

source: HeraldTribune via Gizmodo

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Alan, an ardent smartphone enthusiast and a veteran writer at PhoneArena since 2009, has witnessed and chronicled the transformative years of mobile technology. Owning iconic phones from the original iPhone to the iPhone 15 Pro Max, he has seen smartphones evolve into a global phenomenon. Beyond smartphones, Alan has covered the emergence of tablets, smartwatches, and smart speakers.

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Homeless man charges his phone in the park and gets busted

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