Sherlock taps his nose and smells a rat...

[Acrylic-bob]

At a time when our gallant Police force are once more pleading poverty as an excuse for helping themselves to an even larger slice of the council tax pie, there comes this heart-warming little story.
A special drugs team swooped, we are told, on a warehouse in Great Harwood and seized 400 canabis plants. Hooray! I hear you shout, another slap in the face for evil drug barons, aren’t our policemen wonderful, etc. etc. Hmmm, well, wait and see.

The plants which were seized were, from the look of them, about 3ft tall. Now, I’m no expert in the cultivation of exotic species of plants, but even I know that it would take quite a while for a plant to achieve a height of three feet, certainly longer than a month lets say. I also know that, while growing, these plants exude a powerful and quite distinctive aroma. Have you ever had your nose close to a tomato plant? Well, it’s a lot more pungent than that. Just imagine the smell 400 plants must generate - 24 hours a day - seven days a week - increasing in intensity day-by-day for several weeks while they put on growth.
Indeed, it was the smell which first attracted the attention of the police. Now you would imagine that with the amount of noxious substances that have been peddled and seized in this region since 1968, that members of the constabulary would be fairly au fait with the smell of Cannabis resin, wouldn’t you? So much so that they would be able to spot it a mile off. After all, it is, as I have said, quite distinctive. It is perhaps not even too fanciful to suppose that some of the more experienced officers would be able to identify a particular cultivar, simply from the aroma!
Inspector Chris Hayhurst said his officers were on cloud nine after their record find. An unfortunate choice of phrase it must be said, but he continued: “This is a fantastic example of diligent policing. Well, yes, I suppose it must be. It does indeed make a pleasant change from the constabulary’s more usual response to anything that is not either speed or alcohol related, and a great pity that such diligence does not seem to be applicable where domestic burglary, petty theft and vandalism are concerned.


Let us examine this diligent policing in a little more detail. The warehouse in question, where the plants had been growing for several weeks is situated, not in some remote, out of the way location, but, immediately behind the police station. Officers, their noses twitching, had been passing it daily while walking to and from their vehicles. And so, although they could smell the plants, they still required the services of special helicopter crew, equipped with heat seeking instruments to confirm the presence of an “unusually large” heat source in the building.
Am I alone in thinking that this seems like taking a sledge hammer to crack a nut?
Inspector Hayhurst, who leads Eastern Division’s Support Unit and, to judge from the evidence to hand, presumably lives in cloud cuckoo land, said: “There is no doubt that due to our actions a significant dent has been made in the cannabis market in East Lancashire” A remark which would be laughable were it not so revealing of the sad triumph of imagination over reality.


Let me add all this up, there are the members of the Great Harwood Station, a Special drugs team, an inspector of constabulary, Eastern Division Support Unit and a Special helicopter crew, complete with helicopter ( I am sorely tempted to add “and Uncle Tom Cobbley and all.” but I will resist it). All to enter a small warehouse and seize 400 cannabis plants. Which, forty years ago, would have been accomplished by half a dozen bobbies in half the time with half the fuss and at a fraction of the expense. Is it any wonder that the police are never around when you need them, or that your burglary will go undetected and the burglars free to roam the streets? Well now you know the reason why; they are all off on training courses to learn how to be a Special this or that, or learning how to operate the latest batch of boy’s toys complete with flashing lights and really neat sirens that go wooo wooo! Diligent policing? It strikes me that Inspector Hayhurst and his pals wouldn’t recognise “diligent policing” if it knocked their helmets off and then politely offered to “come quietly”!

[Tealeaf]

I bet the owner of that warehouse is going to get served an ASBO.

[Acrylic-bob]

From what was said in the Observer, I would be surprised if anyone is nicked for it. The more worrying thing is, given the immediate proximity of the warehouse to the station, why the constabulary did not react to the smell sooner. Can it be that the station is habitually filled with the smell of cannabis and thus the smell went largely unremarked?

[Tealeaf]

Nah....the cops did'nt notice it because they were'nt there. They were all away attending Ethnic & Gay awareness courses.

[Margaret Pilkington]

They thought it was OXO they could smell!!!!