Published Sunday August 17, 2008

Dealers get crafty when it comes to hiding their drugs

BY KARYN SPENCER
WORLD-HERALD STAFF WRITER

In the basement of an Omaha home, a narcotics investigator pushed a chest of drawers away from a wood-paneled wall and found a door — and way more than he expected. Behind the wall was a secret room where drugs were stashed — along with the drug dealer's girlfriend.


You never know what household item might be pressed into service as a place to hide illegal drugs, as law enforcement officials have learned over the years. Among such stashes are a soft drink can with a false bottom.

The illicit lair had a bed, clothes, toiletries and bottles of urine. The dealer apparently let out his girlfriend when his wife was at work, said retired Omaha Police Sgt. Mark Langan.

"He had worse trouble trying to explain that to his wife than trying to explain what he had in his house to us," Langan said.

With cases such as that, Nebraska and Iowa investigators weren't surprised at recent news about drugs being smuggled in hidden compartments on trains. Union Pacific is challenging $38 million in federal fines after the Border Patrol repeatedly found drugs hidden in railcars.

The places where drug dealers and users hide their wares is limited only by their imaginations, area officers say.

"These people have a lot of time to think of stuff like this," said Sheriff Steven MacDonald in Fremont County, Iowa.

Cops searching cars find secret compartments that seem straight out of a spy movie.

"The electronics to get into these false compartments is just ingenious," said Mark Overman, a Scottsbluff police detective. "Step on the brake, tune the radio to a certain station and then activate the brake lights — that might kick the compartment open."

Area cops find drugs in cars in a variety of places: inside seats, tires, gas tanks, lights and hollowed car batteries.

One drug ring cut open drive shafts, inserted plastic pipes filled with drugs and welded the shafts shut, Overman said.

Another dealer tried to blend in with the locals by using a horse trailer to haul horses — and 100 pounds of marijuana under the trailer's false floor, Overman said.

Animals were a distraction in the most unusual case recalled by a Nebraska National Guard counterdrug team leader. A man hid his methamphetamine in the bottom of his pet snakes' tank.

In homes, detectives find drugs inside air ducts, in safes under carpeted floors, inside TV sets and wrapped like meat in the freezer. They see false bottoms on cans that look like they would contain pop, hair spray and Pennzoil.

State troopers recently found cocaine underneath chips in a canister of Pringles, Nebraska State Patrol Lt. Scott Kracl said.

Suspects sometimes unintentionally give cops a helping hand.

Omaha police once opened an address book and found a list titled "Hidden cocaine locations." Ajax can. Butter drawer. Shirt pocket.

Yes, it was correct.

In another case, detectives noticed a dirty shovel in the basement, which had a dirt floor, near a spot that looked like it had been recently refilled. A little underground sleuthing netted 10 pounds of meth.

Dealers frequently bury their treasure. "You can get out on a county road, you can look around and see no one's coming," Overman said. "You go out and bury it by a road sign."

The saddest spots are drugs hidden around young children: in car seats, diaper bags, even clothes or diapers children were wearing.

Some people conceal drugs in, um, their own hidden compartment. "We'd run up on people and see them put their hands in their pants," Langan said.

A few times a year, Omaha police get court orders to have medical professionals search suspects' bodies.

The biggest find: A female dealer hiding 17 grams of crack cocaine, about half the size of a golf ball.

Suspects sometimes swallow the goods.

Omaha police get a court order to pump a stomach when a suspect's life may be in danger. If not, they wait until what went in comes out.

Langan said, laughing: "Anyone who thought being a narcotics officer was a glamorous job . . . "

Of course, a few suspects don't bother to hide much.

Sheriff MacDonald recalled stopping a 1966 turquoise Chevy Impala that was going 104 mph.

"The passenger's sitting over there in this lethargic la-la land," he said. He and the driver were so high, "neither of them knew if they were sitting or on horseback."

On the back seat was an open duffel bag, stuffed with money.

The driver, slowly stringing together words, asked, "What's the problem, officer?"

"He has a needle hanging out of his vein, tourniquet still on his arm," MacDonald said, still incredulous. "I'm thinking 'That could be the problem.' "


• Contact the writer: 444-1208, karyn.spencer@owh.com

http://www.omaha.com/index.php?u_page=2 ... d=10408283

Photo Gallery: Hidden drugs--heroin dipped in chocolate and 'packaged' in moon pie wrappers, handbags made of drug containing tubes, and other examples:

http://content.omaha.com/media/maps/sli ... 708hidden/