from the sometimes-stereotypes-are-inaccurate dept.
AlterNet reports:
A 64-year-old man in Orlando was handcuffed, arrested, strip searched, and spent hours in jail after officers mistook the glaze from his doughnut for crystal meth.
The Orlando Sentinel reports that, after pulling Daniel Rushing over for failure to stop and speeding, Cpl. Shelby Riggs-Hopkins noticed "a rock like substance" on the floorboard of the car. "I recognized through my eleven years of training and experience as a law enforcement officer the substance to be some sort of narcotic", she wrote in her report.
The officers asked if they could search Rushing's vehicle and he agreed. [...] [Rushing said] "They tried to say it was crack cocaine at first, then they said, 'No, it's meth, crystal meth'."
[...] The officers conducted two roadside drug tests on the particles and both came back positive for an illegal substance. A state crime lab made further tests weeks later and cleared him. Rushing says he was locked up for about 10 hours before his release on $2,500 bond.
A cop who can't identify doughnut residue? What is the world coming to?
Previous: Are Questionable Drug Tests Filling U.S. Prisons?
Related Stories
Pro Publica and The New York Times Magazine have each written about field drug testing by U.S. law enforcement agencies. The tests are undertaken with disposable kits containing chemicals. A sample is brought into contact with the chemicals and there may be a colour change, which is assessed by the officer. The essay tells the story of people against whom criminal charges regarding illegal drugs were filed, with the results of these field testing kits as the primary evidence in the prosecutions.
According to the essay, the use of the kits has various pitfalls which can lead to false positive results. For one thing, analytes which are legal to possess can produce the same colour change as illegal substances. For another, poor lighting which may be encountered in the field can distort the officer's perception of colours. Confirmation bias can occur. Also, officers may receive inadequate (or--the submitter supposes--incorrect) training in the interpretation of the colours. A former Houston police chief offered the opinion that
Officers shouldn't collect and test their own evidence, period. I don't care whether that's cocaine, blood, hair.
The essay mentions gas chromatography–mass spectroscopy (GC-MS), an instrumental method which is typically undertaken in a laboratory, as providing more reliable results. The submitter notes that portable GC-MS equipment does exist (1, 2).
Nationwide, 62 percent of forensics labs do not conduct further testing in cases in which a field drug test was used and the defendant made a guilty plea. However, the Houston crime laboratory has been doing such testing. They have found that false positives are commonplace. The district attorney's office for Harris County, Texas, which handles cases from Houston, has been informed about those test results and is undertaking "efforts to overturn wrongful convictions." In three years, about as many such convictions have been overturned in Harris County as in the rest of the United States.
Referenced stories:
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 29 2016, @06:56PM
Internet and cellphone videos happened, that's what it came to.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Snow on Friday July 29 2016, @07:03PM
The officers conducted two roadside drug tests on the particles and both came back positive for an illegal substance.
Are the roadside tests really so bad they can't tell the difference between sugar and drugs?
(Score: 2) by Snotnose on Friday July 29 2016, @07:09PM
Yes. Read an article on this a month or so back. Evidently the field tests for drugs come up positive for a lot of non-drug things.
When the dust settled America realized it was saved by a porn star.
(Score: 5, Funny) by Snow on Friday July 29 2016, @07:20PM
Then why even have them? Just buy a glow stick from the dollar store, and if it lights up when snapped, then that's a positive result providing the probable cause needed to violate your rights.
It sure would be a lot cheaper.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by LoRdTAW on Friday July 29 2016, @07:29PM
Remember those phony bomb detectors sold to Iraq? Just another case of selling snake oil.
As for why the police still use it? You have ninnies who are scared of everything and want every bad guy off the street so their precious children can be safe from big bag drug heads. Even if it means inconveniencing a few innocents. They vote. So everyone who wants to keep their job better ensure these fuck heads are happy.
(Score: 3, Funny) by DeathMonkey on Friday July 29 2016, @08:04PM
Remember those phony bomb detectors sold to Iraq? Just another case of selling snake oil.
Better than snake-oil, it's the Probable-Causeulator!
(Score: 2) by DECbot on Friday July 29 2016, @08:45PM
Oooh! Oooh! I need one of those!
It'll look really nice next to my Correlator-Causationnation device.
cats~$ sudo chown -R us /home/base
(Score: 2) by krishnoid on Friday July 29 2016, @07:40PM
After which, it doubles as a self-illuminating cavity search device, which can be then used to violate you further.
We expect this breakthrough to save our taxpayers and our strained police departments a good deal of money in the continuing war on drugs.
(Score: 2) by Gaaark on Friday July 29 2016, @08:01PM
No! You throw the person in the water: if they float, they are a witch!...errrr, GUILTY, yeah... Guilty.
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
(Score: 4, Funny) by Snow on Friday July 29 2016, @08:09PM
And if they sink it's because they are black, right?!
(Score: 2) by DECbot on Friday July 29 2016, @08:48PM
As some terrible people would say, "That solves two problems."
cats~$ sudo chown -R us /home/base
(Score: 2) by davester666 on Saturday July 30 2016, @06:57AM
No, black people sink because they just happen to have a bunch of extra bits of lead in them.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Friday July 29 2016, @09:03PM
Why even have a Drug War?
Well, we forgot to kill off those in power. It's a big oversight.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by mendax on Friday July 29 2016, @08:31PM
This kind of reminds me of something I remember watching in the Dukes of Hazzard TV show in my youth. Boss Hogg took the money from a government grant to buy radar guns and instead bought hand-held hair dryers and a can of spray paint to give them the right color. One wonders if these roadside drug tests are any more reliable than hair dryer radar detectors.
It's really quite a simple choice: Life, Death, or Los Angeles.
(Score: 3, Funny) by bob_super on Friday July 29 2016, @07:10PM
Well, Krispy Kreme donuts are highly addictive, and maybe now we know why.
(Score: 2) by quintessence on Friday July 29 2016, @07:33PM
To be fair, this was about COPS and DONUTS. The distinction between golden fried nuggets of sugar and a highly addictive psychoactive that bestows superpowers and makes your teeth fall out is purely academic.
Not to mention they had just finished their morning "breakfast of champions" and forgot to wash their hands. It was just unseemly to see cops attempting to snort the crystals from the man's shirt. Waste not, want not.
FARK had a Florida tag for a reason. Even if the test were 110% accurate, it was in Florida man. When even the South disowns you, mistaking Krispy Kreme for meth is a minor concern.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Michelle on Friday July 29 2016, @07:09PM
What is the nature of these "roadside tests" - TWO of them - that determined it to be some sort of illegal narcotic? How many people have been wrongfully locked up in our for-profit prison system based on similar "roadside tests" that weren't cleared later on? I wonder if this person will be compensated for his wrongful imprisonment? Yes, our draconian drug laws ARE being used to fill our profit-driven prisons. Hope he sues and taxpayers have to shell out even more money due to overzealous cops. I wonder if the cop, with their "eleven years of training and experience as a law enforcement officer" will be penalized? Haha not gonna happen, of course.
"Right now is the only moment you'll ever have; so why be miserable?"
(Score: 2, Disagree) by PocketSizeSUn on Friday July 29 2016, @07:30PM
If the road side test kit was accurate more cops would be doping the samples that they are send to the crime lab, which is worse.
Lesser of two evils. Let the cops have their fun and hope the courts will clean up the mess.
Fits the agenda too. People with money know enough to *never* allow a public defender to defend them ... so we keep locking up poor people and dumb people and make the ignorant middle class foot the bill.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by DannyB on Friday July 29 2016, @07:31PM
To transfer files: right-click on file, pick Copy. Unplug mouse, plug mouse into other computer. Right-click, paste.
(Score: 3, Touché) by JoeMerchant on Friday July 29 2016, @08:47PM
He will be compensated by the court system in accordance with his ability to use the court system.
In other words: he ain't got the money to pay a lawyer to sue their asses to kingdom come, so, unless he gets really lucky, he gets nothing.
Now, if he had $200K sitting in the bank with nothing to do, a lawsuit would be a pretty good bet, could probably return at least 3:1 on the investment.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 5, Interesting) by AndyTheAbsurd on Friday July 29 2016, @07:13PM
A bigger question than "how come cops can't tell the difference between donut glaze and illegal drugs" in my mind is "Why are drugs illegal in the US in the first place"? This is a country founded on the idea of the rights to the life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. So if I want to pursue happiness by ingesting funny substances, that should be seen as a violation of my rights. (Note that I am not saying that drugs are safe. They're not. I am saying that it should be legal for me to find out if they make me happy. And also I'm 100% okay with increased penalties for crimes committed while under the influence of drugs. But neither possessing nor using drugs should be illegal IMO.)
Please note my username before responding. You may have been trolled.
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Friday July 29 2016, @07:35PM
I don't have a problem with you ingesting funny substances as long as it doesn't negatively affect anyone else. (and that includes alcohol, for example.)
I do have a problem with people having to commit crimes in order to get their next fix.
So there is a line to be drawn somewhere to protect society. I don't pretend to have the right solution. Lawmakers never understand nuanced solutions. They only understand that you kill an ant with a sledge hammer.
To transfer files: right-click on file, pick Copy. Unplug mouse, plug mouse into other computer. Right-click, paste.
(Score: 2) by jdavidb on Friday July 29 2016, @08:22PM
I don't have a problem with you ingesting funny substances as long as it doesn't negatively affect anyone else. (and that includes alcohol, for example.) I do have a problem with people having to commit crimes in order to get their next fix. So there is a line to be drawn somewhere to protect society.
You're right - we should legalize drugs so the costs will be decreased and people won't have to commit crimes in order to get their next fix.
ⓋⒶ☮✝🕊 Secession is the right of all sentient beings
(Score: 2) by vux984 on Friday July 29 2016, @08:48PM
You're right - we should legalize drugs so the costs will be decreased and people won't have to commit crimes in order to get their next fix.
http://heroin.net/about/how-much-does-heroin-cost/ [heroin.net]
The average price for a fix is $15 bucks in Ohio; and a hardcore habit runs $150-200/day. So if heroine were 1/2 the price it is today due to legalization, heroine addicts would be able to get twice as much of it before they ran out of money. But then they'd still be out of money. How does that stop crime?
You think if it were 1/2 price the crimes would stop? Wouldn't they they still commit at least 1/2 as many crimes to raise 1/2 the money?
Is their a desire for a fixed quantity of H; so they just need enough cash for that much H?
Or will they just buy and consume as much H as they have cash to spend, regardless of the price of H?
Or would they just buy higher quality H?
(Score: 4, Insightful) by deimtee on Friday July 29 2016, @09:43PM
If it wasn't illegal, the average price for a heroin fix would be about 15 cents. not 15 dollars. It is probably cheaper than aspirin for actual relevant production costs.
Virtually all of that $15 price goes to law enforcement/courts/drug lord profits/etc.
Legalizing it would mean being able to have standards for purity and quality, which would have the benefit of reducing accidental overdoses. The first ambulance ride/emergency room treatment that you don't have would pay for all the local drugs for a month.
Of course another one of the reasons it won't be legalized is that it is an excellent pain reliever and self-dosing would cut into drug company profits.
There are just too many people making too much money off of its illegality.
If you cough while drinking cheap red wine it really cleans out your sinuses.
(Score: 2) by vux984 on Friday July 29 2016, @10:03PM
Of course another one of the reasons it won't be legalized is that it is an excellent pain reliever and self-dosing would cut into drug company profits.
Why? Its just another morphine derivative. Worst case they'd sell less morphine and codeine and more heroine. And like those; legalized heroine would be heavily regulated.
I don't disagree with you that we should legalize it, but i don't see how legalizing it would stop junkies from committing crimes for their next fix. It would eliminate violence and crime relating to smuggling, transportation, etc of an illegal substance. But junkies are still going to break car windows for a fix whether its legal or not.
I'm in favor of legalizing it; but if you want to deal with crime from junkies looking for their next fix, that's not enough -- you need free dosing clinics and then treatment programs to get them off it.
(Score: 3, Informative) by deimtee on Saturday July 30 2016, @04:17AM
You seem have this idea of junkies as evil crooks who like to commit crimes. This is wrong.
Many of them held down jobs until the sheer cost of their habit drove them into crime. There is no way outside of crime for most people to support a habit that costs two or three times the average income. Drop the cost of heroin to $1 per day for a hard core junkie, and he won't bother mugging people for his next fix.
In fact the whole obsession with getting the next dose would greatly reduce. With a steady, legal supply of high quality and known dosage he may even get himself cleaned up enough to participate in society again. At the very least, he stops stealing your stereo and knifing you in alleyways.
If you cough while drinking cheap red wine it really cleans out your sinuses.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by vux984 on Saturday July 30 2016, @09:10AM
You seem have this idea of junkies as evil crooks who like to commit crimes. This is wrong.
Not really; my sense of them is of people who simply value getting there next fix over pretty much everything else.
Many of them held down jobs until the sheer cost of their habit drove them into crime.
Again, my experience is that they just stop showing up for work; either they're passed out or chasing another fix. Disappearing for days at a time...
Drop the cost of heroin to $1 per day for a hard core junkie, and he won't bother mugging people for his next fix.
Fair enough. I don't see it getting that low though... not without subsidy programs.
(Score: 2) by tibman on Friday July 29 2016, @07:40PM
Don't forget that alcohol was once illegal here. For some drugs it may be racism, surprisingly. Think of it like.. lots of people doing drugs but the police only incarcerate the people they don't like. What's that? My foil hat is on too tight? Ah, yes.. you're probably right :D
Still waiting for pot to be made legal here. Seems like it would be fun to try, judging from peoples comments. I pretty much break zero laws (try to anyways!) so unless they legalize it i will continue to be oblivious to it. But i like your idea of usage. Do whatever you want as long as it doesn't infringe other people's rights.
SN won't survive on lurkers alone. Write comments.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 29 2016, @08:39PM
http://www.vice.com/read/a-former-nixon-aide-admitted-the-war-on-drugs-was-designed-to-screw-over-blacks-and-hippies-vgtrn [vice.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 29 2016, @08:36PM
If you're not happy, you can go to a doctor, who will diagnose your depression and prescribe the proper drugs for it. What's wrong with that?
(Score: 1, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 29 2016, @08:41PM
They don't work. That's what's wrong with that.
(Score: 3, Funny) by bucket58 on Friday July 29 2016, @07:14PM
You'd have thought that a cop would know what doughnut glaze looked like.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 29 2016, @07:17PM
Bad cop. No doughnut for the pig.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 29 2016, @07:31PM
Bad cop. Been snorting too many Krispy-Kreme doughnuts.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 29 2016, @07:34PM
Obvious Joke
So obvious, it was already made in TFS :)
A cop who can't identify doughnut residue? What is the world coming to?
(Score: 3, Funny) by sjames on Friday July 29 2016, @07:29PM
This is what happens when you give "Florida Man" a badge and gun.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 29 2016, @09:00PM
Shieet, even bubbas down south look down on Florida.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by LoRdTAW on Friday July 29 2016, @07:34PM
Yea. 11 whole years of "expertise" led you to believe doughnut glaze is a narcotic. I highly doubt anyone can be that mentally disabled.
Oh this was in Florida? Well then, I stand corrected. Carry on.
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Friday July 29 2016, @07:41PM
You're missing what it really says.
Real message here: that 11 years of training is WORTHLESS.
To transfer files: right-click on file, pick Copy. Unplug mouse, plug mouse into other computer. Right-click, paste.
(Score: 2) by MostCynical on Saturday July 30 2016, @01:18AM
No' not worthless.. Think of all the money the state made thanks to all her prior arrests!
Her expertise is *priceless*
"I guess once you start doubting, there's no end to it." -Batou, Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex
(Score: 2) by tangomargarine on Friday July 29 2016, @08:03PM
If it was ancient glaze from old donuts, that had been on the floor of his car for a couple months, and hardened up into bits of "rock like substance," it sounds like it would look like certain drugs at first glance. Sounds reasonable to me.
The more worrying part is that both of the test kits they used at the scene also claimed it was a drug.
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
(Score: 2) by Scruffy Beard 2 on Friday July 29 2016, @08:13PM
Well, fat+sugar is addictive in a way that either alone are not.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 30 2016, @10:59AM
Well that explains all the stakeouts in the Florida Krispy Keme parking lots.
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 29 2016, @07:45PM
The Orlando Sentinel reports that, after pulling Daniel Rushing over for failure to stop and speeding
Wait, what? Not only was he apparently in a rush, he's actually Mr. Rushing?
Cpl. Shelby Riggs-Hopkins noticed "a rock like substance" on the floorboard of the car.
And the cop who fraudulently locked him up is actually Ms. Riggs?
Who writes this "real life" crap? I want my money back.
(Score: 2) by Scruffy Beard 2 on Friday July 29 2016, @08:19PM
There is a theory that people try to live up to their names *(subconsciously or otherwise). Historically, surnames matched your profession.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 29 2016, @08:40PM
OP here.
There is a theory that people try to live up to their names *(subconsciously or otherwise).
You're probably thinking of nominative determinism [scilogs.com]. Such a name is called an "aptronym". Wikipedia article on aptronyms [wikipedia.org] has a fascinating list of examples.
It still feels like lazy writing, though!
(Score: 1, Offtopic) by tizan on Friday July 29 2016, @08:09PM
Now possession of sugar from donuts is illegal
Where will this nanny state stop...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 29 2016, @08:15PM
I snorted a gram of that stuff once, it was a wild ride.
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 29 2016, @09:43PM
Everything makes sense now.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by GungnirSniper on Friday July 29 2016, @10:00PM
This was an extrajudicial punishment done because some cops have egos worthy of petty tyrants. Anyone who disobeys them extraordinarily injures their egos, and gets hit hard by it. In other words, if this man didn't fail to stop he'd have been given a ticket and sent on his way.
Tips for better submissions to help our site grow. [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 30 2016, @12:41AM
Krispy creme donuts actually contain meth.
(Score: 2) by PinkyGigglebrain on Saturday July 30 2016, @04:03AM
I honestly would not be surprised if it turned out they contained some kind of, legal, meth related compound that triggered the positive on the field drug test.
And given how I've seen children, and adults come to think of it, act after having a Krispy Kreme it also would not surprise me if it really did have some meth in it.
"Beware those who would deny you Knowledge, For in their hearts they dream themselves your Master."
(Score: 2) by Rivenaleem on Wednesday August 03 2016, @08:58AM
I can just see some directors in the Krispy Kreme factories rushing to shred documents and perform a purge of the factory screaming "The secret is out! Destroy EVERYTHING"
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 30 2016, @12:32PM
Something needs to be done about the poor quality of these tests, as well as their use on random bits of debris rather than on things which could reasonably be suspected of being drugs. But in contrast to the last article on the subject, this describes a situation which is pretty close to how it's supposed to go.
This man was in jail for 10 hours - not an unreasonable amount of time to be in jail after being arrested.
The bond was a reasonable amount, and he was able to post it.
He was not coerced into pleading guilty to a crime he was not guilty of, resulting in a lifetime of poor treatment and lost opportunities.
The follow-up lab work was done, done correctly, and when it cleared him, the charges were dropped.
In total, his losses are only a couple hundred dollars for the bond fees, and roughly one day of his time. While that's not nothing, it's not a gross travesty.
And of course, he's suing the police department. It's no surprise given all this that he is middle-class and white. It's unlikely that he'll prevail in his lawsuit, but we can hope. And let's not overlook that he's also getting media coverage. If enough people are made aware, this will change. Right now, if you polled most Americans, it's unlikely that many of them who are not black would cite the police as one of the greatest problems facing the country currently. But enough articles like this and those numbers will start to tick up. That's what it will take, but (in contrast to those who are now doing violence against the police), opinion is likely also ALL it will take. It's still possible to be hopeful. All we need to do is end the War On Some Drugs, and all it takes to do that is deciding to do it.