I'm sure glad RPD saved Richmond from those violent stoners, think about how many more murders there would have been this past weekend otherwise.

Maybe if the RPD's priorities were properly aligned you'd see murdering of snacks at 7-11, not people.

Most street level dealers of hard drugs have been arrested many times. They know the game, they know not to walk around with literal pounds of illegal substances (unlike Mr. Happy Trees) That way when you get caught, you get a slap on the wrist for simple possession and you’re right back on the corner next week.

Sadly this is true. They often do it in groups too. One is selling. One controls money/gun. With optionally a lookout. Then someone drives by every so often to pick up cash to make sure they aren't holding so much that they become a target to other criminals. Also police can't get them with possession & firearm or confiscate too much money as the dude with the money hasn't done anything apparently illegal.

Occasionally you'll see a Porsche or Ferrari pull up and talk to them. I wonder if those are just rich dudes buying drugs or the people running the show. I think the latter since they seem to stay and chat and I never see them buy.

I think if they were inconvenienced enough by being arrested so often, they would at least move their operations. I imagine moving operations would result in a hit to sales.

But I'm sure RPD doesn't want to increase their simple possession charges.

The Happy Trees dude only got nailed because he was flaunting the law hard. They probably would have left the pop ups alone if they hadn't branched out into shrooms and stuff. They were very quickly morphing from a pot based grey market to a black market, and within a few months probably would've gone full Hamster Town based on the trajectory. He's like the last person we want to be the face of legal retail weed.

I'll be the first to say RPD routinely has their priorities messed up, but let's not pretend some great injustice was brought down on Happy Trees.

I don't think it's some great injustice that Happy Trees got brought down.

My issue is that it doesn't feel like there are the appropriate amount of resources being allocated to a situation I think is far worse. Happy Trees is just a case of visible misallocation of resources to me.

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I think you got me confused for some other person.

I certainly think we need to be cognizant of how government officials can abuse their power and waste my tax dollars, but I'm certainly not an ACAB person. I want more cops.

I don't think it took a lot of resources given how open they were about it lol The raid itself, maybe but I don't think they needed a team of detectives working the case for months or anything. Stopping street murders though? That takes a lot of resources and ones RPD don't actually control. Lest anyone think I'm actually defending RPD, I actually view the general inability of police to prevent such crimes to be a good indicator that they need to do a lot of stuff differently. I'm just trying to be consistent in acknowledging that there's not too much they could have done to prevent said murder in the first place.

When I saw vendors selling shrooms, I knew it wouldn't last.

I think you're conflating the problems Richmond is having with policing and its public image overall with one specific policing event out of many that happened that same day—Except the two murders this article is referring to happened in a completely different week and time of day than the Happy Trees bust.

By saying "appropriate amount of resources," it sounds like you're thinking a majority of RPD's time that day and the days that led up to it were spent on this single bust, when in reality, the resources used likely totaled a small portion of one precinct's staffing.

It's the same type of argument people use on "why spend time and money on removing monuments than our schools?" when there are separate budgets and funds and teams for multiple things.

As shameful as RPD's public image has been these past few years, they are able to do multiple things at once because they have several precincts, units, and investigations going on at the same time.

Good point, we should legalize and regulate those drugs, to prevent the cops wasting time on both fronts.

You think we should legalize and regulate coke and heroin?

We can't have people eating mushrooms and being happy though. We need them paying for prescription antidepressants so the pharma companies can thrive!

>Hamster Town

You mean Hamsterdam? lol

Lol Yes, been ages since I went through The Wire so brainfarted on the name.

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Do I support heroin use? No. Would regulation of it prevent a ton of fentanyl overdose deaths? Absolutely.

Cops said they seized from the raid

-127 pounds of marijuana

-150 pounds of marijuana edibles

-14 pounds of suspected mushrooms

-18 pounds of suspected mushroom edibles

Ouch.

Yes. I don't use either, but the people who do use them will use them if they're legal to use/possess or not. Regulating them like we do with alcohol/cannabis would make them at least clean.

Decriminalize all drugs, make rehab available for those that want it, make narcan widely available.

During the search, police recovered around 127 pounds of suspected marijuana, 150 pounds of edibles containing marijuana, 14 pounds of suspected psilocybin mushrooms and 18 pounds of suspected psilocybin mushrooms bars, according to court documents. Officers also secured three firearms, $15,000 and multiple documents during the search.

Ummm not to mention the DMT lab in the back of the shop plus other class 1 and 2 narcotics. This wasn’t just about weed this was about multiple felony count’s happening. This is close to a Rico case and he’s probably not going to see the light of day for a while

what you describe is NOT how most richmond "street corner" drug dealing is set up. what you describe is how its done in baltimore(the wire was somewhat accurate portrayal of Baltimore's drug trade), Philadelphia & other larger cities, but most Richmond street dealing is not set up like that. no idea where it is that you are observing what you think you are seeing, but you are probably misunderstanding what you are watching.

ACAB

cops would probably point and laugh at this post

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Didn't help they were openly doing it at their legit business either.

Please, neighbor, read u/ApocalypticShadowbxn 's comment and really take it to heart.

yes

Is there a source to what was taken? I'm genuinely curious - I know the court charges say possession with intent to sell, and was over 5 pounds. I can't find anything more specific, unless it's recent news.

Either way, with the 5 pounds of marijuana, he was cruisin' for a bruisn'. If the numbers you mentioned are true, along with the added stuff, he's beyond F'ed.

Yes

That all came from RPD

And would likely severely drop the prices. Which would hopefully reduce crime as someone won't have to fence a bike/rob someone to get money for a hit.

Absolutely. Drug abuse / addiction is an illness, not a crime. It is reduced by helping and caring for people, not throwing them in jail or fining them.

Shrooms and herb at just about every smoke shop in DC.

Allowed to sell drugs in the open with impunity? Pls educate me…

Yes

Cool they definitely always tell the truth

Police reports on things like this are usually kinda accurate not to mention I know people who used to work ther and yes they all agree this checks out. Sit down sir

Oh no not mushrooms and DMT, thank god we got them, much safer streets

Completely agree

Yes.

It takes a lot of work to solve homicides because the public won't talk to the police when they know something.

Seems like you lumped a few movies together to describe how drugs are sold and money is exchanged?

Not the same at all. HT dude was just fucking it up for everybody trying to popup.

Definitely a factor, but I want draw a distinction between preventing and solving crime.

How would you prevent crime?

Sounds like minority report

Still a felony. Weather or not I agree isn’t the issue it’s the multiple fu to the police and doing it in a way where they were very open about it. What did you think was going to happen ?

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Damn I’ve been looking for shrooms too. Would have been nice

Well, it's been demonstrated over and over again that the best way to reduce crime is to reduce poverty. Social programs for violence intervention, better education, etc have all been better correlated to long term crime reduction than increased policing. As I mentioned, these things are outside the purview of RPD. IMO, police are better equipped to solve crimes than directly prevent it, so there should be a greater emphasis on that (and coincidentally less blame for failing to prevent it than what OP has given them). If the police demonstrated an actual ability to solve crimes and make people's lives better through that over some of the tactics we've seen in the past (there are good reasons these communities avoid involving police), you'd certainly see more cooperation and better relations between these communities and police in general.

Not a sir. Cops lie and there is always someone who says “but actually these cops don’t lie!” when they do. Doesn’t mean a thing, not because I think all cops are bad but because they routinely lie and routinely deny any wrongdoing even when they have lied and/or broken the law.

I see it every day in highland park three blocks from my house.

They must live in the fan. I see it everyday three blocks from my house.

No your average UR son of a lawyer drug dealer OP is probably familiar with doesn’t do this. But in highland park they clearly do.

What part of Highland Park are you seeing this in? Genuinely asking. I’ve encountered what I assumed was some drug activity by Carolina Market but that has gotten very quiet since August.

Outside six points, I mostly see older folks who appear possibly on drugs but nothing matching your description in terms of operations.

I’ve walked countless times through the area where the shooting occurred and never seen anyone outside except an occasional walker or person waiting for the bus.

NOW, I have seen homes that look like drug houses but again, have not seen drug corner operations like you’ve described. So again, just curious where you see this happening because maybe it’s just not on my radar.