Happy we could be of service

There is a place in my city that is a notorious open-air drug market that's right next to our newest gentrified neighborhood. This means we have a ton of crack addicts and dealers butting up against condos full of liberal white folks who are so proud of themselves for (sorta) living in the hood. Most of these bohemian wanna-bes are afraid of the criminals in their area but aren't exactly sure about what they want done about it. This leads to some very bi-polar moments.

For example, we were doing surveillance near a trendy hippie coffee shop whose owners had complained about the drug traffic. We noticed a nearby dealer around the corner that was keeping the dope in his mouth. A customer would come up and he would spit out the crack rock like a sunflower seed and sell it. We watched for a few minutes and directed a takedown team to where he was at. The officers came up behind him and grabbed him.

Now a common practice of these dealers is to swallow the rocks when the police show up. That's why they keep in their mouths. If they are able to swallow it, it is bad for everyone. We lose the evidence and the bad guy has to be taken to hospital to have their stomach pumped. I've had dealers die on me from eating their stash. I don't give a crap about them dying except that I have to fill out a ton of paperwork and it gets classified as a custody death.

To prevent the bad guy from eating the dope we have a technique where we grab him under the chin and apply pressure inwards and upwards. This doesn't choke the guy or prevent his breathing. What it does do is prevent him from swallowing. Unfortunately it also looks like we are choking the shit out of him.

The end result was that we were able to retrieve several crack rocks and were able to hook up the dealer without having to go to the ER. As we were standing there getting ready to run to the jail, some long haired protester type came running out. He came up and demanded to know my name and badge number. I asked what the problem was and he replied that he was the owner of the coffee shop and he was outraged at our abuse.

He said that he saw us run up to that "poor young man" and start choking him for no reason. I tried to explain that this was one of the dealers HIS SHOP had called and complained out. I then tried to explain to this sheltered PETA protester about crack cocaine being kept in the mouth and all that other stuff. He didn't want to listen and kept going on about our "heavy handed tactics". I mentally said "screw it" and walked off while he was in mid-sentence.

A few weeks later I was driving by there and saw flyers on the wall with the above picture and directions on how to file a complaint with Internal Affairs if you witness police misconduct.

You know, sometimes I just hate people.