So far this has been a very boring week at work. Mostly property crime reports and a few traffic stops is all that we have come across. C is in his third week of phase three training and doing very well despite the fact that he is a Sooner. Our first traffic stop tonight turned out to be a good training experience.
We had just parked in the gas station parking lot at our customary intersection watching for someone to make an illegal left turn. C had not even turned off the headlights when a silver Cadillac made an illegal left turn. We stopped him a few blocks away and noticed very quickly that the driver, K, was very nervous. Some drivers show a few signs of nervousness just because they do not deal with the police very often. However, this guy was off the charts nervous. That usually means that he has outstanding warrants or is in possession of something that he does not want us to find. In this case, it turned out to be both.
C ran his name through the computer and he came back with warrants out of the city and two other agencies for traffic violations. After we confirmed that the warrants with a few phone calls, we went back up to the Cadillac and asked K to step out of the vehicle. He immediately asked if this was because of the warrants. Yes sir, it is. He was very cooperative and after cuffing and searching, C put him in the back seat of the patrol vehicle. I asked K if there was anything in his vehicle that he would not want us to find. He said no. C started "inventorying" the vehicle for the tow slip and immediately found two marijuana pipes. I am not sure about you, but I thought that those would qualify as something that I would not want the police to find.
Even though the pipes had been used to smoke marijuana and had trace amounts of the drug in the pipe, all we could charge K with was possession of drug paraphernalia, a class C misdemeanor, like a traffic ticket. The district attorney's office decided to not file any more "trace" cases for possession. That means if you have a crack pipe or marijuana pipe, your pipe gets confiscated and you get a ticket. So, the users will buy the drugs and smoke them immediately to reduce the chance that they will be found to be in possession of the drug.
Usually for a ticket, all that is required is to fill out the ticket and then complete a racial data form on the computer. But, since this involved a pipe, C had to fill out the ticket, take K to jail for the warrants, take the pipes to the narcotics division, fill out the evidence paperwork, and then write a report since we had to tag evidence. All of that work for a ticket. At least it was a new experience for C, and that makes for a good training call.
We had just parked in the gas station parking lot at our customary intersection watching for someone to make an illegal left turn. C had not even turned off the headlights when a silver Cadillac made an illegal left turn. We stopped him a few blocks away and noticed very quickly that the driver, K, was very nervous. Some drivers show a few signs of nervousness just because they do not deal with the police very often. However, this guy was off the charts nervous. That usually means that he has outstanding warrants or is in possession of something that he does not want us to find. In this case, it turned out to be both.
C ran his name through the computer and he came back with warrants out of the city and two other agencies for traffic violations. After we confirmed that the warrants with a few phone calls, we went back up to the Cadillac and asked K to step out of the vehicle. He immediately asked if this was because of the warrants. Yes sir, it is. He was very cooperative and after cuffing and searching, C put him in the back seat of the patrol vehicle. I asked K if there was anything in his vehicle that he would not want us to find. He said no. C started "inventorying" the vehicle for the tow slip and immediately found two marijuana pipes. I am not sure about you, but I thought that those would qualify as something that I would not want the police to find.
Even though the pipes had been used to smoke marijuana and had trace amounts of the drug in the pipe, all we could charge K with was possession of drug paraphernalia, a class C misdemeanor, like a traffic ticket. The district attorney's office decided to not file any more "trace" cases for possession. That means if you have a crack pipe or marijuana pipe, your pipe gets confiscated and you get a ticket. So, the users will buy the drugs and smoke them immediately to reduce the chance that they will be found to be in possession of the drug.
Usually for a ticket, all that is required is to fill out the ticket and then complete a racial data form on the computer. But, since this involved a pipe, C had to fill out the ticket, take K to jail for the warrants, take the pipes to the narcotics division, fill out the evidence paperwork, and then write a report since we had to tag evidence. All of that work for a ticket. At least it was a new experience for C, and that makes for a good training call.
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