Aurora – Police take over a suspected crack house, jail the occupants then pose as drug dealers, arresting suspected buyers as they come to the door looking to score.
While that scenario may sound like an episode of the Fox TV series “Cops,” police in Aurora want to make that a reality.
Police officials are trying to get an ordinance approved that would make it a criminal offense to solicit drugs, similar to soliciting a prostitute.
They are studying the issue and hope the City Council will eventually support the idea and give them another weapon in their fight against drugs.
Police Division Chief Ken Murphy said a sergeant in the narcotics unit who worked for the Dallas Police Department reports that a similar law was successful there. He didn’t know of any area cities that have the same type of law, and a check of a handful of communities, including Denver and Lakewood, didn’t reveal any.
“The idea is to be able to go after the demand side as opposed to the supply side,” Murphy said. “We’d be going after the other half of the drug trade, trying to clean up problematic areas of the city.”
If approved, the ordinance would target only certain buildings, such as crack houses, and areas where drug dealers sell their goods.
City Councilman Ryan Frazier, chairman of the public safety committee, said the idea sounds like a good one, as long as police do not randomly use it.
“I’m all for giving law enforcement officers the tools they need to effectively reduce crime in our city,” Frazier said. “We have to balance that with the rights and freedoms of the people.”
Donna Hernandez, a spokeswoman for the Dallas Police Department, said its similar law has been valuable to police as they go after the drug trade.
“Any additional tool that an officer could use to work to shut down drug houses is going to be helpful,” Hernandez said. “It is definitely something that our narcotics officers do use, and it has had some impact.”
By running sting operations in drug houses, Aurora’s Murphy said, the word will get out that the police have taken over and will eventually help to rid a neighborhood of other crimes.
“What we’re trying to accomplish is to reduce the victimizing of street-type crimes, such as robberies, as a result of the drug trade,” Murphy said. “Many of the robberies occur as a result of a drug transaction.”
Staff writer Carlos Illescas can be reached at 303-954-1175 or cillescas@denverpost.com.
