The social contract is a sacred thing, and, in the vacuum of constant police surveillance in which most people carry on with their daily-chores, we count on strangers to follow a few unstated or quietly stated rules that help society run with greater efficiency. Don’t sneeze into a crowd of people with one’s mouth open. Don’t cut people off in traffic. Pick up your dog’s shit if you live in an urban area. Don’t throw garbage on the ground. Don’t fake illnesses in order to trick a well-meaning ambulance crew into driving you downtown so you can gambol about the CBD without a care in the world about rush hour traffic, which is precisely what a 51-year-old South Carolina woman did at least 100 times in the last seven years.
According to the Dorchester County Sheriff’s Office, Audrey Ferguson pulled the ‘ol free ambulance ride trick 100-too many times. She was arrested back at the beginning of April (just a measly 24-hours shy of April Fool’s Day, too) when a Dorchester County deputy arrested her at the Trident Medical Center for bumming ambulance rides. Dorchester County EMS Director Doug Warren had suspected for quite some time that Ferguson had been faking, but said that her vague complaints of “abdominal pain” were sometimes linked to a real medical issue, so the medics who responded to her calls were more or less compelled to treat each ride like it was a medical necessity.