About three months ago the drug activity started up again, only to be joined by the neighbors house out of which, I’m told, the renter was selling pain pills.
So, I hard cars picking up sales in one house as they’d done since we moved here, and now the other house had these strange drops and pickups going on.
Needless to say, I started calling the cops. My advice with the Suffolk cops when you see or suspect drug activity is to get up their ass as deep as possible. They aren’t going to act on a mere phonecall. You damn near have to put together a protest to get these people to act.
Here’s what they like to do. First, you call because a buyer has arrived. One is sitting in the car, radio playing, car running, while the other runs in for a courtesy toke and a purchase. Second, you call Suffolk County narcotics. You are put through to a nondescript answering machine. You leave a message and nothing happens. You won’t even get a return call if you care enough to leave a message. Third, when you are frustrated at the appearance of emboldened buyer and seller transactions happening regularly, you call the general police number or 911. The folks at the general police or precinct number ask why you called them, that you should call narcotics. You tell them that you have. They say, “Well, they are probably working on it.” You ask why you didn’t get a return call. They say they don’t know. Once frustrated enough, you get transferred to someone actually in narcotics. Fourth, you tell them what you saw and that you called. They tell you that they are probably working on it. You ask why they don’t respond when you called, and they say, “You don’t know that we didn’t, we may have. We don’t comment on current investigations.” Fifth, you ask, “How can I get someone to respond if I see drug-buying behavior going on.” They tell you to call 911. Sixth, you see a drug deal going down and decide to call 911. You say, “I’d like to report what appears to be drug dealing behavior in my neighborhood.” They transfer you to the narcotics answering machine. Seventh, you call 911 again and instruct them NOT to transfer you to the narcotics office, but that you’d like someone to respond, saying something like, “There is a car idling out front right now, can you get someone to respond?” They get the address and assure that someone will be by shortly. Eighth, you get off the phone. Buyer leaves. Seller leaves to buy a sandwich. Buyer is at home getting high. Thirty minutes later, a cop car shows up and shines a high-beam on the house only to find nobody there. Tenth, you call next time it happens and someone in narcotics tells you, “Yeah, you were calling before. We came by and didn’t see anything.”
Finally, you go fucking nuts! Options? Catalogue all of your calls and contact the precinct captain. I actually called the state rep once.
You know, when it comes to customer service I expect to get treated like shit because the people answering my calls are paid so poorly and are unskilled. Our police, however, are paid through the nose and still treat me like shit. I think Suffolk County narcotics cops suck!
2 responses so far ↓
Anonymous // July 18, 2009 at 2:22 pm |
The problem is the Suffolk County Police Department is run by a County Executive and Police Commissioner who tell the public crime is down when in fact it is on the rise. There aren’t enough cops or specialized details and they are cutting the ones that are in place. Complaining to Captains, Inspectors, Senators or Congressman will get you no where because Steve Levy runs the police department and he doesn’t care about the public’s safety just misleading statistics.
Mr. Peebles // July 24, 2009 at 7:39 pm |
Last week my wife called 911 re: drug activity in our neighborhood (east nawthpawt), asked them to be discreet (unmarked) as they approached. Needless to say two marked cars arrived on the scene shortly. D’oh! Way to go SCPD. I’d say the only way to get the town to do anything is to have it appear in the media. Contact CH12 and Newsday.