Tugrul Turna, or Tug as most of us at DGR know him, celebrated his 20 year anniversary with DGR in November. Originally from Turkey, Tug started working at DGR on November 18th, 1995 and it would be his first job in the States.
Over the years Tug has encountered some interesting situations and collected quite a few stories. One time he was serving a subpoena for records upon a dentist whose office was located at the end of a strip mall. As he was telling the secretary what he had for the dentist, the dentist looked in from an adjoining room and told the secretary not to accept the papers. Tug indicated he was still going to leave the papers and they were only a request for records, not for a deposition or notice of any suit. The dentist became so upset with this that he came around from behind the desk area, yelling at Tug. People in the waiting area stared as the doctor grabbed Tug’s wrist and the secretary came after him, yelling and waving her hands in the air. Eventually Tug managed to break free and started running to his car which was parked at the end of the strip mall. Just when he thought it was safe, he turned to see the dentist chasing after him! Thankfully he managed to get to his car in time and pulled away from the scene without any further incident.
Tug’s favorite story though is when he had to complete a service on a defendant who had been evading right after the big snow storm of ’96. DGR was told he left his house every morning at 5am to go to Starbucks. The only problem was that he lived in a big house on a hill, which was blocked with a fence and en electric gate in front of the driveway. Tug waited nearly five hours that night into the morning in his car, waiting for the defendant to exit. Which wouldn’t have been so bad except snow was piled five feet high everywhere and his car didn’t have heat! With his car parked along the stone fence in view of the gate, he must have looked a little suspicious because a cop stopped to ask him what he was doing. Once he explained the cop left.
Eventually the defendant drove down the driveway. As the gates slowly opened, Tug saw the defendant relaxed and smoking with his window down. Tug took his chance and jumped next to the car, explaining what papers he had. The defendant tried to pull away, but Tug knew he had to finish this service. He held onto the car door and stuck his arm into the window, shoving the papers into the car as the man tried to roll up his window.
Thank you Tug for all you do. DGR wouldn’t be the same without you!
