From: "tom betz" <tom.betz@execnet.com>
Newsgroups: misc.headlines
Subject: choppers fight privacy
Date: 3 Sep 92 00:15:10 EST
Reply-To: "tom betz" <tom.betz@execnet.com>
Distribution: misc
Organization: Executive Networks Information

The following story appeared on page 1B of the Rochester NY Democrat and
Chronicle, Thursday, August 27, 1992.  I offer it here as a fine example
of the tax dollars wasted in fighting the benign weed.

The last paragraph of the story contains one of the most stinging
indictments of the War On Some Drugs that was ever uttered in ignorance by
a Drug Warrior.

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Chopper aids fight against marijuana
by Greg Livadas -- Staff writer

        THROOP - Between the rolling cow pastures and sprawling cornfields
of Cayuga County, a state police helicopter hovers a few feet above the
ground.

        Its pilot, Tech. Sgt. Mark Wadopian, eyes the weeds blown wildly
about under the chopper's rotors.

        He looks for marijuana.  Police use the helicopter when they get a
tip that marijuana might be growing in an area.

        Marijuana farmers "learn new tactics," Wadopian says.  "They don't
plant it between the corn rows anymore.  They plant it in the rows
themselves.  They're getting tricky, that's for sure."

        Troopers have used the helicopter in a marijuana-eradication
program for several years.  When mature, the marijuana plants stand tall
and stick out from surrounding vegetation, which is usually lighter in
color this time of year.

        Growers harvest their marijuana between August and the first
frost.

        Senior Investigator Donald K. Wentworth says most people grow
marijuana for their own consumption.  But others are in it to make money.
He says marijuana sells for as much as $3,000 a pound on the street.

        Troopers have looked for the plants in numerous locations in the
10-county, Troop E area this week.  Yesterday, they found nearly 20 plants
in Cayuga and Ontario counties.  Most were "in cornfields in the middle of
nowhere.  The closest person probably lives a mile away," Wentworth said.

        No arrests were made.

        "Ninety percent of the time you don't get an arrest," Wentworth
said.  "What you're doing is getting the crop."

        A few years ago, the helicopter was used to find a ton of
marijuana growing in a 10-acre Steuben County cornfield.  Troopers
couldn't carry out that much marijuana, so the used a corn-picker to
harvest the entire field and burned the plants later.

        The maximum penalty for growing marijuana is a year in jail.  But
if more than 100 plants are involved, the federal Drug Enforcement
Administration could prosecute, with a minimum mandatory penalty of five
years in prison.

        In one of the searches this week, troopers met with Cayuga County
sheriff's deputies, who had tips on where marijuana might be growing.  The
deputies highlighted maps and the helicopter hovered over the area while
troopers waited below in cars.

        Troopers search areas where marijuana was found in previous years,
where people have seen it growing or where informants say it is growing.

        As the helicopter circled a field next to a farmhouse on a
dead-end street, a woman came out to ask Wentworth, who was waiting on the
road, whether they were looking for a fugitive.  She later said a former
resident of house [sic] was known to grow marijuana, but he had moved.

        "I don't even know what it looks like if I walked through it."

        "Usually, the person who owns the land has no idea that it's
there," Wentworth said.

        Later, Wadopian swooped down below the tree line in the back yard
of another house.  Not seeing any marijuana, he continued on to the next
site.

        That resident - a man about 20 years old - shook his fist and
shouted an obscenity to Wentworth as he drove by.  The man later called
the sheriff to complain about the helicopter.

        "We don't even get the tip of the iceberg, but we want to give
them the fear,"  Wentworth said.  "If we don't give them the threat that
this helicopter may be flying over their yard, every backyard is going to
have it growing."

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Comments? Questions?

This mindset scares the hell out of me.
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