Stroger Hospital Cops: "You think this is a game?"

Durbin locks his doors and its by appointment only now. Stroger Hospital Cops cuff Steve Patterson,

"I'm a reporter," I implored. "I'm not with them."
Pushed to the ground earlier, I was desperate to find anyone who could help convince the sergeant that I was a reporter -- not a protester.

I had backed away from the protesters, who were upset about comments Simon made in a Chicago Reader story years ago, and I repeated again that I was a reporter covering an event, to no avail.

"Cuff his ass," I heard. "Cuff him. Cuff him."

"You think this is a game?" the sergeant asked me. "I ain't playin'."

Democrats win big in Illinois and then put up the no trespassing signs for the dissidents and anyone unlucky enough to look like one,

I was told I was seen chanting with the protesters, that I didn't have an appointment, and that I was trespassing.

And, he reminded me, "If I wanted you down, you'd have been down."

As he led me to an elevator, I told him I was confused -- "I'm not with them. I don't understand."

"Oh, you're going to understand," the sergeant said as the elevator doors closed.

Through corridors and down hallways, past patients and doctors, I was escorted in handcuffs through the labyrinth of Stroger Hospital.

Again, I said, I'm a reporter, in a public building, covering an event -- that's when I was read my rights, told I was being charged with trespassing.

"You didn't have an appointment," I was told. "You were trespassing."

When these guys say appointment you better have one or you may find yourself cuffed disappearing down the labyrinth with a guy playin' no games.