I’ll admit that I enjoy learning about mass transit, and I am probably what you might classify as a “rail enthusiast.” This, however, is a trifle extreme. 43-year-old Darius McCollumn was arrested in New York’s Penn Station Sunday night for “impersonating a transit employee.” That was, indeed, his 26th arrest by transit police, the first of which occurred when he was 15 years old and involved him taking an E-line train full of passengers for a 6-stop joyride. More recently, in 2004 he was found by Long Island Rail Road police in its Jamaica, NY rail yards carrying several official transit keys and an employee uniform, while just earlier this year he was arrested for attempting to enter a restricted area in Columbus Circle, wearing another employee uniform.
Defenders of the man claim that he suffers from Asperger’s Syndrome, though this has never been conclusively proven. He’s never been jailed for long because, despite trespassing and other minor crimes, he’s never hurt or put anyone in real danger. Meanwhile, in a story for the New York Daily News, McCollumn’s mother (whom he lives with in North Carolina) says that she isn’t surprised that he got arrested again, and that he went to New York on his own despite her warnings not to. See, now that’s dedication.