INDEX
» Struggle to fight heroin a reality in Lodi, county
» Heroin trail: From Mexico’s mountains to veins of Lodi addicts
» Lodians talk about their dangerous dance with the needle
» Methadone treatment more than heroin replacement
» Acupuncture helps heroin-hooked moms, babies
» Lodi police officer journeys into nether world of heroin
» The ancient origins, different forms of heroin
» From the beginning: The chronology of heroin use
Lodi police officer journeys into nether world of heroin
By Jennifer Pearson BonnettNews-Sentinel staff writer
While the Drug Enforcement Agency works to bring down drug dealers on a national level and the county has the Metropolitan Narcotics Task Force cracking down regionally, Lodi has beat officers such as Detective Dale Miller.
It is his job to figure out who’s selling heroin — and who’s buying — and go after both.
To do that, he once grew his hair long and stopped shaving in order to buy drugs on the street.
He had real scars tattooed into his arms that looked like drug-user tracks and carried an alternative driver’s license with a fake name and an address from Jackson.
Miller has been a police officer for more than 17 years; 15 with Lodi. Of those, he has spent 11 years working narcotics.
On a typical night on patrol, Miller — clad in blue jeans and a T-shirt — cruises Lodi’s streets looking for people he knows, people who are known addicts.
Sometimes he’s looking to arrest them, other times just to question them.
“We’re looking for dope or guns, usually,” he said, adding that he regularly chats with addicts to find out where they’re staying and what they’ve been up to. That’s the way he works to enforce drug laws.
Miller, who rarely goes undercover anymore, knows the names of many of Lodi’s addicts — or “hypes” — and talks to them like old friends.
“After so many years, you know who’s using and who’s not,” he said. “Driving around, you see things.”
He knows who’s using, he said. He watches them until they look for a seller. Usually, he or she only buys what they’re going to use — oftentimes an amount the size of a match head. At a cost of $20 to $30, it will provide the buyer with one to two fixes, Miller said. They’ll be back for more.
Officers, in general, look for the usual suspects. And, when they find them, they usually use a flashlight to check their pupils.
“A true heroin addict is always going to be high, and the symptoms are always there,” Miller said.
The eyes of someone under the influence of drugs will not dilate normally and addicts usually have open scabs, he said.
In Lodi, the heroin comes in a black tar form. It is usually wrapped in plastic, then in aluminum foil and shoved into a colorful rubber balloon.
Miller said the sellers in Lodi hang out in the “old town area” around Main Street and at Hale Park.
The biggest heroin bust officers here made was two ounces found during a probation search, Miller said. The suspect had just finished making a cut and the substance was still in the coffee grinder when police arrived.
During his undercover days, Miller bought crack cocaine, methamphetamine and heroin in the Lodi area. He was even arrested in undercover busts selling known stolen property and buying controlled substances.
Once he helped catch a big seller in Lodi by bringing to him VCRs and TV sets hidden in old pillow cases in exchange for heroin.
The officer learned the slang; started calling users “hypes” and referring to the drug as “black,” “chiva” and “tar,” words addicts use on the street.
“You’ve kind of got to know what to look for and what to sound like,” he said.
While working with Cracknet, a former San Joaquin County drug enforcement unit, he took note of a dealer who wouldn’t sell to a fellow undercover officer because he didn’t have any so-called “marks,” or drug tracks. To be believable, Miller went into a medical facility and had needles pricked into the skin along his forearms. The wounds turned into scabs, and the undercover buying began.
He looked so believable that once, while on regular patrol, a dealer offered him heroin on the spot. He was wearing a trench coat, but his police radio was stashed in his back pocket and under his clothes he donned a bullet-proof vest.
Although he bought, he never put the balloon in his mouth, instead opting for a pocket.
With his long hair, Miller said it took three forms of identification to cash a check at the local grocery store — and his wife hated it.
In the end, the officer said the Lodi Police Department has been good to him, allowing him to stay in narcotics as long as he’s desired.
“I’d be happy to do this the rest of my career if they’d let me.”