Starting now, if you are arrested for selling drugs out of your home in Belleville, IL you will have a sign posted out in front of your house alerting the rest of the neighborhood…or letting the 14 year old white kid down the street know that he doesn’t have to buy his pot in the highschool parking lot after all.

Belleville individuals who are arrested for selling drugs out of their home will now have signs posted near their residence to alert their neighbors, according to the Belleville Police Department.

Some Belleville residents said they were surprised by the sign policy and don’t think it will change anything. “That’s not going to stop the drug problem,” one Belleville woman said. “It’s just going to make the neighborhoods look bad.”

Another Belleville man suggested the signs would make the drug problem worse because they will point people who want to buy drugs directly to a dealer.

Sax said police discussed this possibility and don’t think it’s likely. “How many people are really going to go buy drugs at a house that they know police are watching and know it’s a drug house?” he said.

Good point.  Its just not like someone needing a drug fix to not think clearly!

Frankly this whole thing isn’t worth the money it cost to create the signs.  Let me tell you why.  For one, the signs are only supposed to be up for one day.  Seriously. One day!  What the hell is that going to do? Now that we think about it though, we’d be shocked if a sign actually made it longer than one day outside because, and I’m not sure Belleville’s finest know this, you can just knock a sign over.  Its pretty amazing. You don’t even have to use your hands…you can just kick it if you want.

Also, you know everyone is going to want to steal one of these bad boys and hang it in their basement above to their home bar they totally took like a whole weekend building and it is soooo bitchin! You would not believe the parties we have here bro!  Cra…zy.

via Globe Democrat

This sexy fella on the right is Officer Leon Pullen and he is accused of robbing 10 prostitutes and sexually assaulting at least three of them.

Using “online advertising” [Editor's Note: *cough* Craigslist! *cough*] Pullen lured his victims to North County city of Uplands Park where he worked as an officer.  According to one of the victims, after meeting up with a prostitute responding to his ad, Pullen took her money and performed oral sex on her against her will in the police station, court documents allege.

The FBI decided to nab Pullen because of, and no, I’m not making this up, “fear he was about to strike again.”

As opposed to all the other reasons rapists are arrested?!  Yeah, they were going to let him do his thing because the local FBI wanted to catch the big game on Saturday night, but then someone said “What if he rapes another hooker tonight?”  Well, crap.  Great questions Johnson, now we all have to go arrest him right now!  …pffft.  New guys!

Pullen’s attorney has already submitted evidence that the accused was certifiably insane and has already suffered enough by forcing his face in to the snizz of a prostitute, to which the judge was like “Eww!  Yeah, totally!”

…I was just joking on that last part, but wouldn’t that have been awesome?

via STLToday

In 2003 the St. Louis police department raided the homes of several potential protestors of the World Agriculture Forum held in St. Louis that year.  After six years worth of lawsuit, the hippies got the cops to settle and, like all bad little boys that do illegal searches do, write an apology letter:

The department sincerely regrets the grievances of plaintiffs arising from the department’s response to the May 2003 World Agriculture Forum including the extended detentions or damages of personal property of the plaintiffs. Infringement of civil liberties of the citizenry was not warranted by what may have transpired at protests in other cities. The department recognizes and values the importance of civil discourse

Somewhere there’s a black guy reading this going “Since when?!”

Each of the four hippies will receive $13,500.  Now what are you supposed to say when you take money from a city and department that doesn’t have any?  Oh yeah…

“Money was never the medium of exchange for our clients,” [The Plaintiff's lawyer] said. “The six-year court battle was to prove they were deprived of their constitutional rights. The letter from the police board is that proof.”

Seriously though, if the cops rolled up on my place and any of the crap they had done to them I would be pretty pissed:

Damaged property slashed bike tires and drenched clothing with urine at one raided building.

Detained a dozen circus performers for riding bicycles without a license — a rarely cited violation taken off the law books two years earlier.

Pulled activists out of a van and told them they were violating the seat belt law. The driver was taken in on drug charges for what turned out to be vitamins, her lawyer said.

Planned raids with a building inspector on at least two buildings that were housing local and visiting activists and arrested 15 people for staying there.

That is just not cool and shouldn’t happen to anyone.

…I mean unless they did something really bad like if they cut me off on the street or something.

via STLToday.com

A St. Louis area police officer pulled over a BMW for speeding the other day and when inspecting the car they found:

$54,200 bones.

Eight prepaid cell phones.

Several ID cards.

Six dozen Western Union reciepts.

17 midgets.

The driver claimed to have been working for an organization that had him buy a prepaid phone to get secret text message instructions on how and where to get cash to send out.  Sadly he won’t tell the authorities where the money or the instructions came from, but I think we both know it was some kinda of awesome sounding group like “Red Claw” or “The Anarchy League” that has a secret island lair that the paid an ass-load of money to make look like a skull.

Actually, now that I think about it, and island base for a large criminal organization is actually pretty dumb.  Couldn’t the world governments just go surround your island or hell just bomb the crap out of it?  It may seem weird to just get everyone together and go bomb the hell out of a island you don’t like, but I hear the Japanese are pretty good at that, so they could probably lead the charge.

Also, I should tell you that I made up the part about the midgets.  But you know what the crazy thing was?  You totally believed me.

Via The AP on Google News [Editor's Note: Take that Associated Press!  Totally linked to your post.  What are you gonna do about it?!  ...Didn't think so.]

The O’Fallon MO police department have joined Twitter!  In other news, the Fonz successfully landed his death-defying jump over the shark.

The OPD have squeezed out a total of four tweets, the first on August 19th, and have managed to scrape together a surprising 49 followers.  @ofallonpolice themselves, are only following St. Louis’ Major Case Squad (@majorcasesquad)

As of this writing, they did not respond to our question via a Twitter reply:

@ofallonpolice Can [I] report a crime over Twitter?

Thank god it wasn’t an emergency!

via Chas Beat

File this under weird.  We were recently sent a link to an experience with one local guy and a local McDonalds.  [Editor's Note: Thanks to our tipster!  You know who you are...]

I would try to explain this, but its best I don’t.  I’ll let the email he sent to McDonalds do the explaining:

I went through drive-thru and ordered one double-quarter pounder meal. When I got to the drive thru window I was asked to move forward. Having problems with McDonald’s in the past taking a long time to make food if I pulled forward I told them no, I did not want to move forward, I will wait here for my hamburger and fries. They continued to knock on my window for about a minute until a manager, Marie, walked out of the McDonald’s, approached the car and knocked on my window. I told her I would like to just wait for my food here and to please go make it so I could leave. She knocked several more times before she went inside. Another McDonald’s employee came outside and directed cars in drive-thru to leave McDonald’s and exit the parking lot. After waiting several minutes I rolled down my window and asked if the food was done. My reply was the middle finger from one of the employees and comments of “he must be crazy”. They then locked the drive-thru window. After waiting ten minutes I knocked on the drive-thru window and asked for the food or money back. No response. I pulled out of drive-thru, parked my car and entered McDonalds. I patiently waited at the front counter. After 2 minutes the manager addressed me, saying they would not serve the food or provide a refund and to talk to the police outside. I went outside and spoke with the police and told them what I have written here. The manager came out too. The police told the manager to go get my food. The manager did so and the police said I could leave.

We will admit that we aren’t a fan of the “pull forward so we can take forever with your meal” play many fast food joints employ, but we can also say that we never thought to just sit there…and then try to return our food.

We want to give out a hardy “Good for you!  Stick it to the man!” but frankly you both sides are crazy in this battle.  [Editor's Note: That's a common theme these days in St. Louis.]

Oh wait!  There’s video!

Apparently there was quite a string of thefts in O’Fallon, MO involving some punk kids going through cars.  Never fear though, the O’Fallon Police Department have solved the case after a COPS-worthy foot chase!

On 07/22/09, at approximately 3:06 AM the O’Fallon Police Department received a call from the Patriots Landing subdivision in reference to two juveniles going through a vehicle. Officers responded and a rolling perimeter was established. Sgt. Jeff Lange located the subjects and engaged them in a foot chase, taking a juvenile into custody.

After that thrilling scene, some $5,409.41 dollars in stolen property was recovered and if its yours come claim it from the O’Fallon PD!  What kind of things did they uncover?  Glad you asked… (emphasis mine)

Items as of 08/06/09, that were recovered but no victims are known include: back pack, wallets, car air freshener(1), radar detectors, bandana, golf cleats, bead necklace, Gatorade(2), hammer, IPOD(3), IPOD charger, car adapters, knife, GPS units, car chargers, tool(4), watch, battery in case, car lighter, suction cup mount, mini mag light, Gameboy game(5), nail clippers(6), lighters, Johnny Cash CD, IPOD case, locket, tootsie roll bank(7), pocket PC, binoculars, nail clipper set(8), flashlight, ear piece, AC/DC converter, Portable DVD player, camera, MPS player, Satellite radio receivers, cellular phone, thumb drive, items containing currency.

Lets go through the amazingness of this list together shall we?

1. Is the economy so bad that you are going to go in a claim your car air freshener?  …come to think of it, how the hell would you claim that?

2. It was at this point in the press release I felt like this was a joke.  Nope, its not.  Come get your Gatorade…still half full we hear.

3. This list item isn’t really silly as much as it is annoying.  Why, after all these years, figure out how to correctly type the word “iPod”…little i, capital P lowercase “od.”  Not hard.

4. Tool.  Feel free to insert your own joke here.

5. Make sure to swing by to claim your Super Mario Land for game boy…the one where you can’t tell the differnce between Mario and Lugi because the screen is black and white and 3″ high.

6. Nail clippers.  Yup.  Nail clippers.

7. I don’t know about you, but if someone stole my Tootsie Roll bank out of my car, I wouldn’t know what to do with myself.

8. Oh you have nail clippers?  Damn, not mine.  I had a whole nail clipper set stolen from my car…what?!  Awesome!

All in all, thats a large list of crazy crap that was recovered…wouldn’t hold out much hope for the tape deck though…or the Creedence.  [Editor's Note: Huh?]

Source: O’Fallon Police Department press release

Do you ever wish your local government would look each other in the eye at a meeting and decide to put the plot of a lame 80’s movie sequel in to motion?  Well its your lucky day Fenton, because your town just emulated Police Academy 4!

From the press release:

The St. Louis County Police Department, West Count Precinct and City of Fenton Precinct will co-host a Citizen Police Academy at the Rockwood Band Meeting Room 1037 Majestic Drive, Fenton, Missouri 63026.  The classes will be held on eight consecutive Thursdays, beginning on September 17, 2009, from 7:00 PM to 9:00 PM, with graduation on November 5, 2009.

From the Police Academy 4: Citizens on Patrol IMDB summary:

A new batch of recruits arrives at Police Academy, this time a group of civilian volunteers who have joined Commandant Lassard’s new Citizens on Patrol program. Although the community relations project has strong governmental support, a disgusted Captain Harris is determined to see it fail.

This is going to be awesome! …well thats assuming there is at least one skinny black guy that makes funny noises in Fenton.

The amazing Michael Winslow everyone!

A little while back we told you about the brewing war between St. Louis’ NBC affiliate KSDK and St. Louis Cops.

It appears channel 5’s reporter Leisa Zigman didn’t feel reportery enough so she got out her fedora, tucked her press pass in the band and went off to uncover a scandal!  Long story short, she didn’t find one.  Instead, Zigman decided to do a “report” on St. Louis police officers parking in no-parking spaces throughout the city, including in front of their own station!  [Editor's Note: Dun dun daaaaaaaaa!]

In the last 2 days the piece is finally out (you can see it and the video on KSDK’s site).  Its clear from reading it that after the initial attention this story got, and the fact that not many were on KSDK’s side, they decided to hedge their bet, just a little:

Does this violation rise to the level of an FBI investigation into the department regarding an alleged towing scandal? Of course not.

Does this parallel the last years indictments against two veteran officers accused of planting evidence and dealing drugs? No.

But, the question raised is whether police or any public official is above the law, even if it’s just parking laws.

The slight backing off (and we mean very slight) hasn’t helped the cool the boiling blood on the other side.  A quick stroll through the local police message board found remarks such as:

Thanks Lisa. What a news story. I’m sure you will get the Alfred E. Newman award for waste of film. I want you to investigate why my neighbor’s dog barks only at 6AM and wakes me up.

That was fun to watch. Excellent display of reporting!! NOT

The empty spots that she showed as being designated for police officers are NOT for police officers. She didn’t even bother to read the freaking sign. Those are for city hall employees.
Sloppy work on her part. Lazy work.

I even wrote Leisa beforehand and commented on this asking her if this was really news worthy? She did write back and said to watch the segment. She said what we really need is more police parking. I did not get that from the segment.

As far as we are concerned, the only Police Officer that should be fined is the one in the second quote above that is still using “Not!”