Late night, big town, police, shake down…
This story first broke on
Fans of a certain age will remember well the nervousness they felt when DB was arrested, along with three others, at the Americana Rochester Hotel in the early hours of March 21st after a show at the War Memorial in Rochester, New York.
Press reports on both sides of the Atlantic screamed “Bowie Busted” (still have the cuttings) and there was genuine concern that our man could be sent down for fifteen years after he was charged with “fifth-degree criminal possession of marijuana”.
Anyway, after raising the $2,000 bail each for himself and his companions (who included one James Osterberg, Jr.) David returned to have his picture taken four days later on the 25th.
Above are the fruits (steady) of that photographer’s labour in what has to be the coolest busted rock star photograph of all time.
Well now, if you have the right cash, you can enjoy a slightly more dog-eared version of the above print in the comfort of your own home, as
In the event, as you may have noticed, DB didn’t go down for fifteen years and he emerged from the incident squeaky clean.
Still kind of ironic that he was busted for possession of marijuana, particularly during this period of ‘experimentation’…somebody at Rochester PD wasn’t doing their research properly.