Pot odor wafts to police station--"Dude, the cops will never smell it"

**CTR man** · 01-07-08, 11:30 PM

How stupid can they be?

http://www.app.com/apps/pbcs.dll/art...1/1280/LOCAL04

LAKEHURST: One man was charged with marijuana possession after the odor of burned marijuana wafted through a chain-link fence separating the rear of a Pine Street home with the rear parking lot of the police station.

About 2:20 a.m. Saturday, Sgt. Ronald Heinzman had just finished a shift and was walking to his personal car in the lot when the odor of burned marijuana carried through the crisp air, he said. He went back into the police station and asked patrol officers Christopher Gibson and Matthew Kline to come outside.

The officers approached the rear yard of the home where police believed a small group had been smoking marijuana. The group had gone inside the basement of the house and were gathered there under a double-door hatch, Heinzman said.

While the officers were standing outside the hatched door, they could hear conversations. The group was talking and laughing about the irony of smoking pot while next to the police station, Heinzman said.

The officers knocked on the door, and the person who answered was surprised to see three uniformed police officers standing there, Heinzman said. The officers were invited inside by the person renting the apartment and had answered the door, Heinzman said.

Several people were at what appeared to be a small party. Police said they had smelled burned marijuana, but the partygoers said they had no knowledge of such activity. One man, Benjamin Gordon, 18, of Farmville, Va., tried to leave the room by going upstairs. He was stopped, questioned by the officers and subsequently was determined to be in possession of marijuana, Heinzman said. The others said they did not participate in smoking the pot, police said.

Gordon was issued a summons for possession of less than 50 grams of marijuana, Heinzman said.

It had otherwise been a quiet night on patrol, Heinzman said. "But it was priceless to see the look on the face of the person who opened the hatch door to the basement to find three uniformed police officers standing there."

Margaret F. Bonafide