Another good night

Had an amusing and productive night over the weekend - spent the first part just catching up on some dog stuff, and cleaning out the truck. Stayed away from all the admin stuff & the radio was quiet, so there weren't even any calls to help out on. After that I called it an early day, since I had plans to work another special last night. Number one, it's good for the overtime money & #2, I always like finding drunks as we all know. Plus, maybe I'd get lucky and stumble into something more, although I wasn't holding my breath...

So, I headed out for the special a few minutes early, since I needed to gas up the truck and all that. Then, while heading into the spot for the night I spot a car that looks good - enough that I know I'll get something out of it, but I figure it will just take a couple of minutes to sort things out and get on with things at the roadcheck. Turns out that, yet again, I was wrong...

Starts out with a suspended driver and a passenger both, and a car that just reeks of weed from 10 feet away. Given that this is what we call in police work a "clue" I was happy when one of my old midnight shift coworkers pulled in behind me to back me up on it, as it let me jump right into getting the guys out of the car and starting the next phase of the investigation. Of course, neither of the stories matches up and the pat-down comes up with a VERY large chunk of suspicious money as well on one of them.

Then we get to the car... surprise, surprise... not only do we have the marijuana from our earlier party, there's also some cocaine left in the back. We then start what I call the "toddler game" that all these guys seem to play - you know the "Who's is this?" "Oh, not mine! I've never seen it before!" Doesn't matter if it's their car, their bag, their pants, or even their wallet with ID in it - once you find the durgs suddenly nobody owns or knows anything... And, it works just about as well as when a four year old tries it. Meaning not a bit. Heck, I don't even know why they still try it - like they operate under some misguided hope that the cops are going to say "Oh, well if no one owns the dope I guess we'll just go away then!"

Of course, that doesn't happen - instead, it just leads to me digging through every bit of the car I can, pulling out more evidence of both use and dealing & then a nice trip to jail. One of them is making his first trip and really not sure what to expect; the other has a long history of this very thing so he & I both know the game. The funny part is though it's the guy who's done time for dealing who has all the incriminating pictures on his phone - shots of him with cash, with drugs etc. Yes, over the past few years the criminal element has embraced technology as a way of scoring their victories as well apparently - not even thinking about how it can come back to haunt them later. Not that I'm complaining, just helps me out more.

So I get to end my night with a couple more drug arrests, plus taking a chunk of drugs and money off the street... I also got the fun of feeling like a street cop again for a little bit. I love what I'm doing now, it's a nice change from the road and all of that - but there are times I do miss playing the game and finding things like this. One of the benefits of my flexibility now though is that I can still get out and do this sort of thing now & then.