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The home of Berwyn Heights, Md. Mayor Cheye Calvo was raided on Tuesday, reports the Post, and police recovered 32 pounds of marijuana inside. A SWAT team also shot and killed Calvo's two dogs when they entered the home.
Now, considering we're the home former Mayor Marion "Bitch Set Me Up" Barry, it's hard for the District to laugh too hard at this nearby small town. Then again, 32 pounds is a lot of marijuana. That's way more than could possibly be intended just for personal consumption.
Calvo maintains his innocence, telling the paper he's "never done drugs in my life." The package was addressed to his wife, Trinity Tomsic, who works as a finance officer for the state. The raid was organized after a police dog at a shipping facility in Arizona identified the package as containing marijuana.
The scene Calvo described of being surrounded by pools of blood from his dead dogs is pretty horrific. The raid was conducted by the Prince George's County Sheriff's Department, and the Chief of the Berwyn Heights Police Department argues at the end of the story that had he been notified of the plan, he could have easily entered Calvo's home to investigate without killing the two dogs.
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"without it i could go.....blinder!"
Disgusting story, absolutely disgusting. Did they just go in shooting? What if there had been kids running behind the dogs? Drug dealer or not you don't need to go in with guns blazing.
Why did they shoot the pups?
And WTF is Berwyn Heights ? PG County has more tiny-a$$ corrupt towns that any place Ive seen...
When you like the reefer, you like the reefer........all 32 pounds of it.
I just want to know what 32 pounds of weed even looks like...does it get delivered on a wooden pallet with a forklift or what? How do you even get it through the door?
I love how having a lot of marijuana is automatically thought of as intent to sell or even excessive. So if I go to CostCo and pick up a 12-pack of paper towels and a big drum of mustard, I intend to sell them on the street?
32 pounds of weed sounds like a spin on barry & levon's pudding...
@IMGoph: except that's way more than $240 worth of weed...or so I've been told...
A bunch of PG County cops are gonna blaze tonight!
Couldn't they have just maced/pepper-sprayed/tasered the two dogs instead of gunning them down? Sheesh. Poor animals.
Will this be on WTOP's Knuckleheads in the news. FREDTERP
I agree, I think this is pretty disgusting. I find it suspicious that 32 pounds of weed all the sudden is being sent to the mayor's wife. Is that all they were going on? Any other prior evidence that she is distributing marijuana? And I find it pretty horrible that they go in with guns blazing shooting dogs. Cops always exasberate everything. Hot heads.....
@ demonfafa:
I think comparing a giant tub of mustard from CostCo to 32 pounds of the chronic is a bit of a stretch. Maybe if it were 3 or 4 pounds, but 32? It would take Cheech, Chong, B-Real, The entire Portland Trailblazers roster, Owen Wilson, Woody Harrelson, Matthew McConaughey and Willie Nelson a week to smoke all of that.
whats sad is that the two dogs were black labs...i'm pretty sure they weren't bred to kill kill kill!! and the 2nd dog, the young one, they shot while THE DOG WAS RUNNING AWAY. what a horrible story.
DANG!!! Those dogs weren't smoking dope. If the police any wits about them, they would have shot the drug dealers, not the dogs. Bad, police. Bad!
Unfortunately, this has basically become SOP for the militarized SWAT units now used for simple tasks like delivering warrants. It's disgusting.
http://www.reason.com/news/show/33289.html
Too bad they weren't yellow labs, they may have lived. We all know in PG, black = shoot on sight.
As a lab owner myself, I know they can bark up a storm, but there's no way they would attack a group of armed SWAT officers. When the cleaning lady is so afraid of the dog she won't go to that side of the house, it's funny. When trained officers with automatic weapons don't know the difference between a vicious attack dog and a frightened retriever, it's scary.
i dunno, between Woody and Willie, i think they could polish off 32 pounds of dope in about 37 minutes.
hey, why doesn't Costco sell weed? how awesome would it be to buy a pallet of kind bud and then go ravaging through the free food samples?
Just another example of the militarization of the police.
Fucking idiots.
32 pounds of weed is actually *just the right amount*. And thank god for Ron Paul, at least in this instance -- http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/07/30/frank.marijuana/index.html
The moral of the story is, if you really hate someone or their dogs, just mail them some mj and watch the fireworks!
The other thing -- if a drug sniffing dog ids it as marijuana, how are you sure it is, rather than something made of hemp? There's no indication they ever opened the package en route.
And yeah, 32 lbs is pretty heavy. The story is probably going to get weirder.
Berwyn Heights is close to College Park (right around where REI is). I know the mayor and his wife through a friend and was beyond shocked by this story. The wife's big vice is that she occasionally sneaks a Marlboro Light without her husband knowing, and he is, as he claims, very anti-drug. Definitely not big time drug dealers or even users.
Their labs were big (100 lbs+) and rambunctious, but that describes most labs and is certainly no reason to shoot. Also, as the Post article points out, this is the Mayor, someone who is familiar with area law enforcement officers- they couldn't have sent someone over and asked them to step outside or crate their dogs? It's just sickening and makes you wonder, if this is how they treat the mayor of the f'ing town, how is the little guy going to fare in a similar situation?
I think my ex-girlfriend's sister used to own that house.
As a lab owner myself, I know they can bark up a storm, but there's no way they would attack a group of armed SWAT officers.
So what exactly would they do to an armed intruder? Unlock the door, show them where the kibble is stashed, and turn on Animal Planet?
I think we're all missing something important here. In addition to working part time as the mayor, he "serves as director of expansion for the SEED Foundation." Guilty!!!
I don't understand the PG law enforcement double standard.
On the one hand, PG elected and law enforcement official refuse to enforce, or help enforce, Federal immigration laws because they are Federal, not state or local laws.
But on the other hand, the same hypocritical officials push the enforcement of federal drug laws by the local gestapo and go all out breaking doors down and shooting pets.
If they can pick and choose which laws are to be enforced, and which are not, why can't the rest of us?
Two words, Mr. Mayor: coffee grounds
Calvo maintains his innocence, telling the paper he's "never done drugs in my life."
Well It is good to see that he learned well from the gangster movies, never touch the product only sell it.
hmmm... maybe we should send 32 pounds of pot to some other politicians homes?
Maybe start with the SWAT team commander?
I think there is a lot more to this story and it probably involves some sort of complicity between the Mayor and the Police Cheif. That's why there was so much weed, that's why a full on SWAT team was used, and that's why the local cops were basically left out of this entire operation.
Mr. Mayor and his wife weren't moving 32 pounds of marijuana without some serious help...
everyone knows that mustard never goes bad, but the weed...
anyway, i didn't care too much until I read they were labs. I've got a soft spot for labs...
maybe they were reefered?
Isn't the MO basically that you ship your drugs UPS to the neighbors' house then snag the package off of their porch before they get home?
the snozzberries taste like snozzberries
-Car Ramrod
This bust on the same week Cheech & Chong announce their reunion? Surely this is not a coincidence.
Here's the quote that got me:
I'm not even an animal lover, but this guy's flippant attitude really pisses me off.
As a lab owner myself, I know they can bark up a storm, but there's no way they would attack a group of armed SWAT officers.
So what exactly would they do to an armed intruder? Unlock the door, show them where the kibble is stashed, and turn on Animal Planet?
No, mine is afraid of large rabbits, so it would probably run and hide. Which is exactly what it sounds like this dog was doing when it was shot.
Oh Catwoman or your canine-loving equivalent, where are you when we need you?
I believe the Chief has psychological problems. Why does he think the "town clowns" should be called? He is just kissing ass and Monday morning quarterbacking an officers split second decision.
The Spurberry Police....
"and Willie Nelson a week to smoke all of that."
Methinks you underestimate Willie Nelson's capacity for weed-smoking. The man put out a reggae-country fusion album. What more proof do you need?