Illinois Sheriff Caught Selling Lots of Marijuana
Wow, you don't hear a story like this everyday. Oh wait, actually you do. Thanks to the drug war, dramatic incidents of gratuitous police misconduct have become painfully typical:
ST. LOUIS (AP) — Sheriff Raymond M. Martin has been the law for nearly 20 years in a struggling southern Illinois county. But federal prosecutors say he's been breaking it lately by peddling pounds of pot, some seized by his own department, often in uniform and from his patrol vehicle.Authorities on Monday led away a handcuffed Martin, 46, from his small Shawneetown office after his arrest on federal drug trafficking charges accusing him of supplying a dealer he threatened to kill when that man said he wanted out. The Gallatin County sheriff also allegedly pledged to use his authority to shut down rival drug traffickers.
For 20 years, this creep was the sheriff? Can you even imagine all the filthy things he's done in that time? One of the many reasons the drug war fundamentally will never even begin to work is that you can't even trust the "good guys." I shudder to think how often the federal drug war dollars we pour into regional law enforcement end up accomplishing nothing other than to assist corrupt cops in cornering the local market.
The whole thing is such a colossal joke, it's amazing that anyone would even bother to defend it anymore. Just look at it. How much more fraudulent and corrupt must this thing become before everyone understands what it is?
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reddithey
Comment posted by Anonymous on Tue, 05/19/2009 - 9:34pmhes the sheriff and a damn good one so what if he was sellin pot good for him at least there are no other drug dealers there and hes an awesome cop A SEXY COP just make sure he arrest the losers he sold to
Corrupt Cops
Comment posted by Anonymous on Fri, 05/22/2009 - 7:29pmI want ot point out that this would have been a good time to mention "Corrupt Cop Stories" in the Chronicle. If your not checking out that one, shame on you. I love that posting and check it every week.
an awkward problem with
Comment posted by dust4ngel on Wed, 07/29/2009 - 11:59pman awkward problem with criminalizing drugs is that you artificially hike the prices so high that the incentive to get into sales is outrageous - drug cartels make so much money that they can often out-finance city and state police departments by orders of magnitude. if you are being at all serious, you'd have to be shocked when police who have access to huge drug seizures and relative legal immunity *don't* get into the drug dealing business.
we get the message
Comment posted by Anonymous on Tue, 05/19/2009 - 9:25pmO.K. we get the message about the "failure" of the drug war, but really, hasn't it actually been an immense success for the people that designed it? It's been a police bonanza. The Partnership For a Drug-Free America was created by liquor and pharmaceutical companies. That fact alone speaks volumes. They certainly aren't complaining about a lost drug war. They love that the competition was driven underground.