Regardless of whom you believe in this he-said, she-said story, Nicholas Luciano has had a terrible holiday season.
The trouble for Luciano started at about 1 p.m. Sunday when he was pulled over for what police said was a routine code violation at Bristol Street just south of Newport Boulevard near the 73 Freeway.
As the officer walked up to the driver’s side of the Lancaster man’s car, he saw Luciano quickly shove something into his mouth, Sgt. Mark Manley said.
When questioned, Luciano admitted he swallowed some pills because he was nervous about getting caught with them, Manley said.
So the police, worried about the man’s health, called for an ambulance ticketed for Hoag Memorial Hospital Presbyterian to have him checked out.
He was arrested on suspicion of possession of a drug without a prescription and released, Manley said.
Luciano had Xanax, an anti-anxiety drug, and another drug, but Manley wasn’t sure which one, he said.
But Luciano’s family offers a much different story, accusing the police of Scrooge-like behavior as the Lancaster man struggled to catch a plane to get back to South Carolina to see his father, who is gravely ill.
Luciano’s sister, Lori, who was on the phone with him at the time of his arrest as she tried to give him directions to the airport, denied that her brother swallowed any pills and added that he insisted he be drug-tested at Hoag to prove his innocence.
Nicholas Luciano’s woes continued as he struggled to get his car back and change his flight plans to see his father.
“Right now we’re in hospice, and we don’t think he’s going to make it past the holidays,” Lori Luciano said of her father’s health. “Is this what Costa Mesa does to travelers when they get lost? And not to listen to a man who’s trying to get on a plane because his father’s dying? How inhuman can you possibly get?”
Nicholas Luciano was unavailable to comment himself as he struggled to change his flight plans, said Lori, who lives in Bluffton, S.C.
Nicholas Luciano has prescriptions for painkillers after he hurt his back in a savage mugging several years ago, Lori Luciano said.
He works in Palmdale in street maintenance, and his back gets cranky at times so he needs his medicine, she added. Lori Luciano didn’t think it was any big deal for someone to have their medication mixed together in the same container.
