Editor’s note: The following is an excerpt from “Atlanta Cowboy: The Fight for Vine City” by Warren Pickard. This gripping account chronicles a beat cop’s relentless battle to protect his community as crack cocaine devastated Atlanta’s neighborhoods in the late 1980s, turning Vine City into ground zero for the drug trade.
Chapter 31: Rats, dime droppers and snitches
“Don’t use words too big for the subject.” — C.S. Lewis
I had been away from the dope game and chasing dopers for a couple years. Like technology, the game had changed. Beepers and pagers were gone. Deals were discussed on burner phones now. Dope dealers preferred to sell from the convenience of their living rooms than the street corners. We needed to get in those living rooms. Around this time, cops started cultivating snitches. On paper we called them Confidential Informants. That was akin to putting lipstick on a pig. A snitch is a snitch. They play on both teams. Their loyalty is as temporary as a paper drinking straw. After a while, you can’t get anything useful out of them.
I’ve heard officers say, “I have a good snitch.” I’d always ask, “Is it your mother?” because that is the only person you can truly trust. I hated snitches and didn’t trust them. Yet, they were a useful tool. They lived in the community and knew all the players, gossip, and crime. If a snitch really hustled the streets, finding traps and dropping their dimes in the right place, they could make a lot of money. I’ve said this a thousand times, a cop without at least one snitch is a liability to their police department. Someone has to tell you who did what, when, how, and why. Your mother can’t do that.
I had three or four snitches over my career. My team had a couple go-to as well. The Bluff was still fertile ground. In the early 1990s, when I was working the corners as a beat officer, the citizens were lying down and sleeping on what was happening in Vine City. They are still not as engaged as I would prefer, but at least they are sitting up and are aware. The tip lines were busy. The information frequently landed on my desk. I sent my team to investigate a complaint about a house on Vine Street. They did a cruise by and determined the house was “Up.” Up was what we call a trap actively selling dope. If activity wasn’t popping at the house, it was considered “Down.” Words like that cut down on a lot of useless chatter. I could just say it’s “Up” and everyone listening knew what time it was … time to knock a door off the hinges!
We had an appointment with a snitch today. Over a Whopper Jr., we briefed him on what we needed. Snitches are always hungry if you’re buying. First thing, we made sure he wasn’t already high. He said he hadn’t had a smoke or a needle in a minute. Who the hell knows what that meant, but he had enough sense to put ketchup on his fries so we could work with that. My officer searched him to make sure he didn’t have any weapons or drugs on him before he went inside the house. As important as it is to the case that he come out the house with drugs, it’s more important he doesn’t go in with drugs. Snitches that play for both teams ─ cops and crooks ─ will frame a rival’s trap. They’ll take drugs into a house, come out, and tell the officer they bought it from so-and-so inside. The easy way to put your rival out of business is to have the police do it for you. Some days we’d send a snitch to buy dope from four or five houses. They would get paid for each attempt, whether it was a successful buy or not. In addition, they received large payouts depending on the amount of dope and money seized because of the warrant.
After he was sanitized, he was given cash to make the purchase. We set up in our surveillance locations to make sure he went to the right house. Every detail of an operation like this is important to an officer; cutting corners will get you a federal inmate number or a casket. After about 10 minutes, our snitch emerged from the house. We followed him and picked him up a couple blocks from the house. Dude was nervous as hell and sweating bullets.
“What’s the deal, bruh? You buy dope all the time. What’s this nervous shit?”
“They weren’t up!”
“What you mean … ‘they weren’t up’? We saw 5 people go in the house after you. Somebody selling something in there!”
“They robbed me. They took the money.”
“What the fuck? You kidding, bruh?”
“No … no dope … no money.”
“Get yo’ ass in the car.”
It was the first time I’d ever had a snitch robbed. That’s money flushed down the toilet. It’s not like I could go knock on the door and ask for it back. “Hey, you just robbed my snitch and I want my money back.”
We took him back to the precinct. I started on my paperwork to report the loss, and I still had to pay him for the attempt. As well as searching prior, you have to conduct another one after. One of my officers started the process, turning pockets inside out, checking in the ear cavity, under tongue, scrotum and butt cheeks — all the usual hiding places. The snitch was still sweating bullets. One officer snatched off his shoes and socks. I went to my office to grab the case file and put $25 in it. I brought it out and tossed it on the table.
I was pissed. “Pay his ass and get him out of here!”
“We’ve received eight tips in a week on that spot … they got to be up.”
I turned to walk back into my office and stopped mid-stride when I heard someone yell … “Lock that motherfucker up!”
I looked down at the now partially nude, sockless, shoeless snitch. Between his toes was the corner of a little green baggie. I was Georgia asphalt on a 95-degree day — hot and pissed now. I looked at my team and said, “Would your mother do that? I have said it a thousand times: the only person you can trust in this world is your mother.” They laughed.
He was immediately handcuffed. An officer put on latex gloves and removed the baggie. It contained a $10 hit of crack cocaine. He was arrested. Idiocy of greed: the $25 in the file would have been his once he’d been searched. He could have taken that $25, bought two hits of crack and still had change enough for a full Whopper.
About the author
Warren Keith Pickard, a United States Marine and retired Police Sergeant, served the Atlanta Police Department honorably for over 30 years. As he rose through the ranks of the Atlanta Police Department, from patrol officer to detective to supervisor, he has conceptualized his theories on ethical energy and how that energy may change cultural behavior. Having earned many commendations for bravery and dedication to duty, including two Medals for Valor and two Proclamations from the City Council of Atlanta, he is considered one of the most decorated officers in the history of the Department.
Prior to joining the Atlanta Police Department, he served as a Platoon Sergeant in the United States Marines. He credits the Marines for the early development of his ideas of occupational ethics, discipline and character.