cannabisnews.com: Secret World of Snitches





Secret World of Snitches
Posted by CN Staff on November 15, 2002 at 21:38:48 PT
By Michele Holtkamp, Daily Journal
Source: Daily Journal
Some call them snitches, narcs or rats. Others might say they are common criminals who can’t be trusted because they implicate other criminals only to save themselves from the slammer.But police say using confidential informants is vital to solving crimes and ridding drugs from Johnson County communities.
“The effectiveness of any law enforcement agency is directly related to its relationship with the community,” Greenwood police chief Al Hessman said.That means police must go beyond educating schoolchildren about the dangers of drugs and patrolling school yards. It means police must interact and rely on information from drug users and people who associate with burglars and thieves.“Informants have been and always will be a critical part of what we do,” Hessman said. “It always takes the human element to make the case.”Some police agencies pay those who deliver information leading to strong prosecution cases against criminals. Others allow the tattletales to work off charges they were previously arrested on by providing information about a drug supplier or acquaintances who are operating a burglary ring.Everyday police work relies on tips from the community, officers say.A motorist calls police with a vehicle description after seeing a suspected drunken driver weave across the roadway.A good Samaritan tells an officer about all the people — and suspected drug sales — in the house down the street.A speedster feels grateful that an officer didn’t issue a ticket and later calls with information about a crime as a way to say thanks.But some police departments have day-to-day interaction with criminals they nab on the way to jail.Tell us about your drug supplier, police tell those about to take a ride in the jail wagon, and the charges against you will disappear.Police are hesitant to say how many confidential informants they use and whether and how much they are paid. Hiding information about them is crucial not only to successful police investigations but also to protect informants from criminals who may realize they are being ratted on.Investigators say some informants come and go, some stick around for years and others exhaust police manpower with tip after tip.Police insist on this: Informants must prove their credibility and stay out of trouble. And officers won’t come to their rescue if they’re caught in another crime.Quid pro quo In Greenwood, informants could come to work for the police department through a couple of scenarios, Hessman said.Police could arrest a man on minor marijuana charges. Instead of hauling him off to jail, narcotics investigators offer to keep him from the lock-up if he’ll provide information about his supplier.If willing, the soon-to-be informant is quickly “wired” — fitted with a hidden microphone — and sent back into the mix.“A lot of times, if you let those people think about it, they won’t do it,” Hessman said.The informant will pick up discussions of drug sales with their supplier, while police monitor the conversation and build a case. The informant escapes conviction.Other times, informants are wanna-be cops who’ll provide information just to get a taste of police work.Police use informants as a way to introduce an undercover officer and build a case.“We just don’t take John Q. Citizen’s word and go in and knock the door down,” Edinburgh Deputy Police Chief David Lutz said.In Edinburgh, informants must be able to offer information that could build a case against someone else that is at least two or three times more serious than the charges they were facing, Lutz said.And no informant can work off a crime they’re accused of committing against another person, he said.Informants aren’t privy to any police information — they are supposed to be the ones providing the information.“They’ve got better resources than we do,” Lutz said.Greenwood snitches can earn $25 to $100 for a set amount of information. Money set aside for undercover drug buys in the department’s budget covers confidential informant costs. While departments won’t say exactly how much money each year is spent paying snitches, they do say it isn’t enough to become a career informant.Credibility at issue Police agencies usually have a set policy for accepting someone into the informant circle. In Franklin, police check a potential informant’s name, alias, Social Security number, cell phone, pager, employer, vehicles, family, military background, criminal background and criminal associates.“Then what we do is try to determine their motive,” Detective Pete Ketchum said.Ninety percent have information and want to work off their charges.“That’s OK,” Ketchum said. “That’s the norm.”But officers are more reluctant to trust those who have an ax to grind or want revenge, Ketchum said.Police say informants have to prove their credibility and build on it.“You have to really watch them and control them,” Hessman said.Edinburgh informants sign a form that notifies them they are now agents of the government and can commit no crimes.“It’s all up-front,” Lutz said.Witness protection Greenwood police must protect informants at all costs, Hessman said.Investigators quiz informants on how to act if they are accused by criminals of snitching.Their names won’t show up in court documents. Police use the information as a lead into a case — and would dismiss a case rather than divulge an informant’s identity, Hessman said.Informants have no formal training in Franklin, Ketchum said, but officers do rehearse with them.“’If he says this, then you say …,’” Ketchum said, describing the rehearsals.Informants also sign waivers indicating that they understand the activity is dangerous.“We try to protect them at all costs,” Ketchum said. “We don’t want them to get hurt.”Visual surveillance also is important, Ketchum said, so police can prepare for a rescue, if necessary.Informants know how to handle themselves, Lutz said.“Usually they’re savvy enough, streetwise, that they do pretty well on their own,” he said.Once, a Greenwood informant was discovered wearing a wire and police monitoring the conversation had to go rescue him.Other informants have moved from the area.But no high-profile cases of an informant being beaten or killed show the length police go to guard their identity, police say.Being an informant isn’t a ticket to continue a life of crime, but police admit informants are likely to continue drug use as a way to maintain a relationship with the supplier they are turning in. While police don’t condone the activity, informants are told to let them know if they are going to be at an event where drugs will be used.“We have to control them,” Hessman said. “If we don’t, they’re no longer assets.”Informants will often give away information on a drug supplier in the community — but not their own. That’s because they don’t want to give up their own lifestyle of drug use, Lutz said.Greenwood and Franklin police have used teen-age informants in the past under certain circumstances. In those situations, it must be with parental permission and in strictly controlled situations.Solid evidence of drug dealing — gathered through informants and hidden-microphone surveillance — helps police and prosecutors bring charges against drug dealers. The drawback to using a confidential informant, however, is that the dealer’s defense attorney will attack the snitch’s credibility — and attempt to show jurors that authorities “bought” the informant’s testimony with promises of leniency. If the case goes to trial, then jurors have to decide how reliable the informant’s testimony is.Smaller departments Oftentimes, individual officers develop a relationship with at least one person in the community who likes to share information.In New Whiteland, officers will accept that volunteered information but don’t pay for it or allow those arrested to work off their charges in exchange for it. Partly, that’s because the department doesn’t have the money to pay them.Officers will use the tip as a lead in a case, Lt. Edward Stephenson said.“We never use an informant’s word by itself to establish anything,” Stephenson said.In Trafalgar, the police department is so small that the Johnson County Sheriff’s Department handles major investigations there. If officers catch someone with marijuana, they may “cut them some slack” for giving up their supplier, Town Marshal Gary Hall said.Prince’s Lakes officers don’t use any confidential informants right now, but they have in the past and wouldn’t be opposed to it in the future, Town Marshal Greg Southers said.Bargersville snitches get sent to another agency that has the manpower and money to devote to such investigations, Police Chief John O’Rourke said. Source: Daily Journal, The (IN)Author: Michele Holtkamp, Daily JournalPublished: November 16, 2002Copyright: 2002 The Daily JournalContact: letters thejournalnet.comWebsite: http://www.thejournalnet.comRelated Articles & Web Site:PBS Frontline -- Snitchhttp://pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/snitch/Snow Job - Texas Monthly http://cannabisnews.com/news/thread12336.shtmlShaky Evidence Makes Mockery of Dallas Busts http://cannabisnews.com/news/thread12263.shtmlFake Drugs Force an End To 24 Cases in Dallashttp://cannabisnews.com/news/thread11771.shtml 
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Comment #1 posted by DdC on November 16, 2002 at 20:42:15 PT
D.E.A.th Paraphernalia... 
At every corner some kind of sinister evil method of Nazi Gestapo manipulation. Pisstasting away the 5th amendment or this snitch incentive. Releasing drunk drivers to snitch on medicinal cannabis patients. Snitch junkies incentive to remain snitch junkies and not rehabilitated. Incentives to pay white powder paychecks, cops dealing hardrugs to junkies snitching on ganja users in the privacy of their own homes. America is D.E.A.thly ill with these methods of curtailing alternative healing and recreation and religion, and mostly an alternative to the chemicals and fossil fuels with the non-psychoactive hemp. 99% of the cannabis war eradications. Snitches are lowlife scum because of prohibition they exist. Every single word the D.E.A.th maggots utter. Every bit of abusive conditions is happening during prohibition. They use their fabricated tortures and perpetuate the war with them. How sick is that? Poison people with crude oil pesticides for their own good? Fighting to poison people for their own good. These very stupid naive twits standing by watching them John Philip Sousa and jerk off the Iraqi crude plastic rw&b to perpetuate the war on ganja the alternative to poisoning their babies and elders. Hip Hip Hurrah! Snitches, plea bargains, confiscations, forfeitures, no knock no crime secret searches, anonymous tip probable cause. Mandatory minimums, 3 strikes, importing prisoners to overcrowded dungeons, rape, violence and humiliation to deter cannabis in the name of profit and stupidity watching it.Peace, Love and Liberty or the Idiots of D.E.A.thDdCIdiot wind, blowing every time you move your mouth,
Blowing down the backroads headin' south.
Idiot wind, blowing every time you move your teeth,
You're an idiot, Bush.
It's a wonder that you still know how to breathe.Idiot wind, blowing through the flowers on your tomb,
Blowing through the curtains in your room.
Idiot wind, blowing every time you move your teeth,
You're an idiot, Wally.
It's a wonder that you still know how to breathe.Idiot wind, blowing like a circle around my skull,
From the Grand Coulee Dam to the Capitol.
Idiot wind, blowing every time you move your teeth,
You're an idiot, Ashcrap.
It's a wonder that you still know how to breathe.Idiot wind, blowing through the buttons of your coats,
Blowing through the laws that you wrote.
Idiot wind, blowing through the dust upon your shelves,
You're all idiots, D.E.A.th.
It's a wonder you can even feed yourselves.
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