Column: Guest Column

Another week of Citizens Academy has passed, and I can’t believe we only have two classes left before we’re done. It’s been fun and educational, that’s for sure. Thursday we again heard from officer Steve Charboneau, this time about drug investigations. Then we met officer Tim Harves, who along with officer Adam Conn, spoke about the department’s bike patrol capabilities.

 

Drug investigations

Officer Charboneau has been involved in drug investigations and drug busts in his time with the department and said that’s he’s been to specialized training. He talked about many different drugs including marijuana, cocaine, methamphetamine, heroin and others and said that since there are so many and so much information about all of them that we would mostly be skimming the surface of the subject. He recently went to a training about meth that lasted three days and said that even that could have gone longer.

Lt. Jeff Strom was also there Thursday and interjected anecdotes and information as well. He mentioned that while meth busts were huge in the early 2000s that there have been fewer and fewer since then. With the restrictions on buying Sudafed, making meth has become harder.

Charboneau talked about how they often find drugs and paraphernalia during traffic stops (which is the most common way they interact with residents.) There are restrictions to when they can and can’t search a car, too. Charboneau went over a large number of indicators that can help him have the probable cause he needs to search a vehicle. There were long lists of actions (from behavioral things to vehicle appearance) that could indicate drug trafficking. While just one indicator, like breathing rapidly or foot tapping, wouldn’t give him probable cause, if there was a multitude of indicators, he’d have a pretty good idea the person was involved in illegal activity.

Strom said most drugs travel east and north, while the money travels back south and west. Though meth is made locally sometimes, it is much different from the meth they see that’s made in Mexico. Charboneau said with less restrictions, there are big operations that can make large batches of the substance.

Though once and while they have large busts of drugs, they’re often looking for a small baggie or having just a few pills. Use of prescription medications is on the rise, according to Charboneau. Both he and Strom said sometimes it’s hard to find these small amounts, but when they do having any trace amount of a drug that’s not marijuana like meth or cocaine is a felony offense. The same goes for having medications without prescriptions.

“The stuff is really hard to find,” Strom said.

Often they’ll find a little baggie with one pill or a small amount (as little as an 1/8th of an ounce) of cocaine or meth hidden in wallets, different areas of the car or even in a body cavity.

Other highlights of the presentation included some things I wouldn’t have thought about. Apparently it’s pretty easy to catch people who try to grow their own marijuana because it takes a significant light source, so all cops have to do is pull up the energy bill to see that they’re using much more energy than the average household. Also interesting was the fact that people get busted for the amount of drugs they have, meaning that if they bake marijuana into something like a pan of brownies, they’ll be charged for the entire weight of the food instead of just how much marijuana is in them.

Charboneau also highlighted how dangerous it is to make meth, much less ingest it. There are many safety hazards since almost all of the ingredients are poisonous, and to make it you must use an accelerator like gas and heat the elements. Then there’s the havoc it wreaks on your body, including making you pick your skin, rotting your teeth and a host of other side effects.

 

Bike patrol

I have to be honest, when I saw on our schedule that we would learn about bike patrol, I wasn’t that excited. No offense to the officers, but I didn’t think I’d learn much. Well, I was wrong. It was actually interesting and I learned that it’s a useful tool for the department.

We learned that the department has had bike patrolling since 1998, and it has a variety of ways that its useful. I had never thought of it that way, but biking is almost silent compared to being in a vehicle. Not only can officers hear much more, but they can sneak up on people.

Conn and Jason Taylor both said that often juveniles or groups of people will see or hear a car and be able to hide or run away. With bikes, officers can move more quietly and get to places that a car can’t, like across a park or in certain alleys.

There’s also the cost savings for the department, even if the bike needs a tune-up once a year, it’s much cheaper than a car. They mostly use them on Fridays and Saturdays in the summer months and for special events like the Third of July Parade.

Since the department is also concerned about making the officers more accessible and approachable to the public, bike patrol is one way to do that. Since they’re often dressed more casually and easier to approach than if they were sitting in a car, they get more contact with residents.

“A lot of people are just curious about the bike,” Taylor said. “It’s just good citizen contact.”

There’s special training to be on bike patrol, and seven of the officers are qualified. Training includes how to use the bike as a weapon, how to dismount while in motion and other handy tricks. All in all it was an interesting presentation about another aspect of the department.

Stay tuned for next week when we learn about computer crimes and the department’s community service officers.

 

Kelli Lageson is the special projects editor at the Tribune. She’s enrolled in a weekly Citizens Academy put on by the Albert Lea Police Department. Email her at kelli.lageson@albertleatribune.com.