Smoking is a nasty habit, and quitting can be a challenge. Some people try the nicotine patch, while others apparently go to jail to quit smoking. Etta Mae Lopez decided to assault a police officer so she could go to jail, where smoking is not allowed. The 31-year-old waited all day outside the Sacramento Sheriff’s Department for a deputy to exit the building. That deputy just happened to be Matt Campoy. “All of a sudden, she stepped into me and slapped me in the face,” said Campoy. “She told us that she needed to stop smoking.” Things worked out exactly as Lopez planned — she was sentenced to 63 days in jail and 3 years of probation. A neighbor who knows Lopez said she does smoke a lot, but he can’t figure out why she chose the cessation plan she did. “There’s easier ways to stop smoking than hitting a cop,” he said. Kimberly Bankston-Lee, with the anti-smoking group Breathe California, agrees that coldcocking a cop isn’t the best way to quit cold turkey. “If it led somebody to do something like that to quit, that lets us know in the community that we have a real problem,” she said.
