What was supposed to be nothing more than a simple parking violation, turned into jail time for a local downtown merchant Tuesday, February 12, 2008, in Municipal Court Judge James Lagomarsino’s courtroom.

The owner of Black Jack McCanless Steakhouse and Saloon, Rick Hocker, refused to pay the $50 fine and court costs after a six member jury decided he was guilty for violating a City ordinance stating it is illegal to park in an alleyway except to load or unload a vehicle in an expeditious manner.

“How can any business owner downtown be able to work on their building if you can’t even get near it to do anything!”

Hocker continued to defend the fact that the reason he was parked in the alley was due to construction work taking place inside the building he owns, and the equipment he was using had to be stationed on a trailer attached to his vehicle while it was being used to make necessary improvements to the inside of his establishment.

Corsicana Police Officer James Hudson issued the citation on January 8, 2007, after he had noticed a black Ford pick-up, owned by Hocker, in what is considered an alley between East Collin Street and East Sixth Avenue.

Hudson told the court he drove by the area during the course of an hour and observed the vehicle was still parked in the same spot, at which time he proceeded to write the citation.

“I didn’t know where the owner of the vehicle was,” Hudson stated, after City prosecutor Micah Haden asked him if he attempted to locate the vehicle’s owner. “For all I know, the vehicle belonged to someone in the bar at Napoli’s (a statement he referred to numerous times during his testimony). I didn’t see any activity around the vehicle.”

“As a police officer,” asked Haden. “Are you required to know the City ordinances?”

“Yes,” Hudson said.

“So you are familiar with the City ordinances then,” Haden asked.

“Yes, except for maybe some of recent ones that have been added,” Hudson, replied.

The officer said he was also concerned with fire regulations regarding alleys, and stated that it would be a problem for the fire department to get emergency vehicles in and out if someone was parked in the way.

“Napoli’s was pretty crowded that night,” said Hudson.

Hudson was also asked how long he thought, with all of the tools and equipment in the vehicle, it would take to unload everything.

“I’d say … it shouldn’t take more than maybe 20 minutes,” He said.

Hocker’s lawyer, David Lamb, asked Hudson, “Approximately how long did you spend observing the parked vehicle in the alley.”

“About a minute or two total,” Hudson said.

After Hudson left the stand, Hocker informed his lawyer that he wanted to take the stand in his defense.

“At the time, I was only trying to do some work on my building,” said Hocker, “and needed to park, where I parked, in order to use the equipment on the trailer. As far as the door being closed to the building … heck … it was January … and cold!”

At that point, the prosecution took a more aggressive tone in their questioning.

“Are you familiar with the phrase, ‘Ignorance of the law is no excuse,’” asked Haden, rather intently.

“Yes sir, I am aware of that phrase,” Hocker replied, defensively. “If I had known when I received my first permit for the building, I surely would have gotten one for that … somebody should have informed me of that at the time!”

“You could have read about the ordinance online,” replied Haden.

“It’s kind of hard to figure out what I’m suppose to have when I would get about 12 different answers to my questions,” Hocker said, firing back.

Judge Lagomarsino intervened at this point in order to dose a little “water” on the “fire” to prevent the situation from heating up more.

Judge Lagomarsino disallowed some of the statements made during testimony, stating that some of the comments made were either hearsay, or irrelevant to the case as each side strayed from the issue on occasion.

After each side presented its closing arguments, with Lamb asking the jury to use common sense in the fact that Hocker may have been parked illegally, but the intent was to work on his building and nothing more than that.

Lamb’s argument seemed to infuriate the prosecution as City attorney Haden got up immediately after Lamb’s remarks and specifically told the jury, “Common sense out the door … this is about the violation of statue … City code! That’s what you folks need to decide … whether Mr. Hocker broke a City ordinance!”

The juror adjoined to deliberate the case for over a half an hour before eventually ruling in favor of the prosecution.

“I don’t think this is right,” Hocker said, later. “How am I suppose to be able to use the equipment I need to work on my building. I can’t park out front without a permit. I can’t park next to my building in the alley.”

Hocker has said he is trying to do everything possible to comply with the City in order to obtain his Certificate of Occupancy, and has wanted nothing more than to be treated the same as a few other restaurants located here in Corsicana that serve alcohol and received both a C.O. and alcoholic beverage license before they opened their doors for business.

“What’s fair, should be fair all the way across the board,” Hocker said. “Why treat one business one way, and let other businesses slide!”

Hocker stated that each time he has completed work in order to get his C.O., the City comes up with something else that needs to be done, and, some of the plumbing work that was already tagged good to go by the City after thorough inspections were made, had to be re-worked.

“Here we (explicit) go again,” Hocker said, clearly frustrated. “This last problem … I just went ahead and got a plumber out here to get it fixed because I know the City would come out and hassle me about. I figured if I went ahead and took care of it, the quicker I could get my C.O., even though … again … it was tagged and ready to go and had already been approved … again … by the City!”

Hocker recalled one incident earlier last year involving one of the City’s inspectors in relation to one of the reasons he hasn’t been able to open up.

“We just finished some work, and thought everything was fine … good to go,” Hocker said. “The City inspector came out … green tagged it … and went on his way. The next day, the same inspector came out … took off the green tag and replaced it with a red tag and told me the work needed to be ripped out and replaced! The biggest problem I had was the fact the City hired the owner of another steakhouse – no longer in business – to make inspections … this guy was the main person responsible for all of the extra money that I have spent to get everything in working order. Like I’ve said before, this person would say the work that was done was good to go, and the next time he would tell me I needed to either redo the work or replace it entirely … and this individual claims he is a victim … he doesn’t even know what the word means … at least he was able to run his steakhouse while he was employed with the City … I’m still struggling, after two years now, just to get a (explicit) C.O.!”

Hocker said his main contacts with the City have been through City inspectors or engineers, but has rarely had any dealings with Planning and Zoning Director Sherri Warren.

“Somehow,” said Hocker, “it has been noted (in the media) that Warren has made it a point to talk with me each and everyday to see if I’m ready to open. That an outright, bald-faced lie! And it upsets me even more because I have not heard from her on a daily basis. She doesn’t call me! The only time I hear from her office is when one of the inspector’s drops by.”

Hocker decided on Monday to paint the front of his downtown building a bright pink with lime green trim in order to make a statement concerning the small business owner, and how he feels the City is unfair when dealing with the “Little man.”

“I’m totally for revitalization,” he said. “But I think the City should do more to help small businesses, too! Whether I get open or not, hopefully, the next small business owner won’t have to go through everything I’ve had to go through … at this point I have no desire to open up … as long I as own this building it can stay pink.

“Yeah, I’m sure there are a lot of people that think I’m crying about the whole thing,” Hocker said, “but if nobody makes a stand, then how can anybody running a small business in this town, ever expect to stay in business … much less expect to be treated fairly just like any other business.”

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