Message #236498

[Kristin Moore]

He then began to scream at the top of his lungs things like "you bet there's a cop car there, and I can get him right now and have you arrested! What are you doing here? This area is completely off limits to the public," and so on in the same vein. I asked him what the problem was. I said that all the maps show this to be a State Park. I asked what was going on around the area, and said as well that we saw no signs indicating the area was restricted, and why should it be so restricted? He kept yelling and screaming at us, saying that I was lying about the signs as he had put them up himself. I then mentioned that I had been hearing a lot of things about the area recently, and he went nuts again, screaming that anything I had heard was a bunch of lies! I never even said what it was I had heard.

Finally my wife asked him to please calm down as we both (?) had children with us. He said, "look, he's arguing with me, he's arguing with me", and then he ran off, never going to get the police after all that. I continued to make challenging comments and every time I did he'd turn around, come back and yell in my face with the baby stroller held behind him, then turn and run away. This was some of the most bizarre behavior I'd ever seen. He soon got away from us and as far as we could tell he just disappeared. We were at a place where there was a clear view in all directions and he was nowhere to be seen. It's also clear that he didn't have a baby in the stroller; he was pushing it very roughly and was constantly trying to keep us from seeing into it. During our last exchange I was able to get a peek into the stroller and I saw what looked like a doll, mostly covered with a blanket, and a pack.

I spoke to Preston Nichols later and told him of our experience. He was very interested and said the individual I had encountered with the stroller was most likely Donald Balcuns, officially a State Parks vehicle maintenance worker who is actually a base security guard. Nichols explained that Balcuns had been responsible for getting himself and two others arrested and charged with trespassing in a restricted area, when they weren't even within the inner (restricted) perimeter.

After speaking with Nichols, I looked up the name Donald Balcuns in the phone book and called him. I explained who I was and that we had just had a big argument earlier that day at Camp Hero, and said I wanted to clarify a few things. Balcuns never missed a beat, and never asked me how I got his name or number. I told Balcuns that I used to live in the area and wanted to check out the relatively new state park property, and that in fact we really didn't see any signs the way we entered the base. I asked him why the area was restricted to the public. Balcuns said that there are toxic materials all around and also that the buildings keep getting vandalized so they have to keep people out.