After a drunken phone call to 911 in which he threatened to kill police officers back in March, 58-year old Richard Dameron of Ohio was ordered by a judge to wear an "idiot" sign apologizing to police after he completed his second 90-day stint in jail, CBS News reports.
This week, for 3 hours a day, Dameron is fulfilling his public penance in front of the Cleveland precinct, as sentenced by Cleveland Municipal Court Judge Pinkey Carr, who is known for making a woman who swerved around school buses hold a similar sign back in Nov. 2012.
The bright yellow, handwritten sign reads: "I was being an idiot calling 911 and threatening to kill you. I'm sorry and it will never happen again."
Not only did Dameron make the threatening phone calls, he originally skipped out on his punishment back in June, telling the judge he did not have a ride at the time and was drunk. He was then taken back to court and hauled off to jail for another 90 days.
"I'm sorry for being a fool like I am. And I hope that Officer Simone and his family takes my apology because I was drunk. I apologize from deep down," Dameron told CBS affiliate WOIO. "I just want it to be over with and done."
Judge Carr has said she often gets creative when serving up punishments for people in order to get through to them. In Nov. 2012, was faced with 32-year old Shena Hardin, a woman who had dangerously driven on a sidewalk to avoid as school bus unloading children. Carr ordered Hardin to stand at an intersection wearing a similar "idiot" sign for two days, the sign reading, "Only an idiot drives on the sidewalk to avoid a school bus."
"I was under the influence of alcohol, very deeply into it." Dameron told WKYNC. "We just got to rambling off, acting like fools... I do feel bad about it, cause the man's never done nothing to me."
