The Second Doublewide on the Right, part 63

I’m Fixin’ To present part 63 of The Second Doublewide on the Right:

A Magistrate Judge has to be available at all times, even nights and weekends, in order to accommodate law enforcement by signing off on arrest or search warrants. Besides the elected judge in Ocmulgee County, there were two other part-time judges who were appointed so that one of them was always available at the courthouse or on call in order to evaluate that evidence presented to them was sufficient enough to sign off on a warrant.

Deputy James Earl Murphy knew which one was on call on Sunday, and it was the one he wanted, the one who was a fraternal brother of his and the one who wouldn’t be such a stickler on meeting the probable cause standard in order to issue a warrant. He had timed it this way because he knew he might have difficulty with the elected judge since he had already convinced him to issue a search warrant on Quantavious Carter that had turned out to be a waste of time and resources.

The deputy waited until late in the afternoon on Sunday before placing the phone call, because he didn’t want to disturb the judge until he had attended church, had Sunday dinner and watched the game. It was about six in the evening when he called.

“Hey, Sam, this is James Earl,” the deputy spoke into the phone, “I hate to bother you on a Sunday, but I really need to get a search warrant issued tonight.”

“Hey yourself, James Earl. Looks like we both got Sunday duty. Uh, can’t it wait ‘til tomorrow morning?”

“I’m scared it can’t. According to my informant the drugs are scheduled to be moved tomorrow, and you know how it’ll be down at the courthouse in the morning. There’ll be so much going on that it’ll be late in the day before I could get it issued and by then the bad guy and the drugs might be gone. I need to make this bust tomorrow before the drugs and the dealer disappear.”

“Who is the suspect?” Judge Sam asked.

“His name is Quantavious Cortez Carter and he operates out of Shady Grove Trailer Park over in Apt-To-Miss.”

“Sounds like one to me. You got the paperwork done?” the judge asked.

“Got every T crossed and every I dotted.”

“Well, why don’t you come on by the house and I’ll sign it for you. It sounds like that boy needs to be locked up.”

It took the deputy until a little past noon on Monday to get everything lined up, but it was a sweet feeling when his cruiser roared up to Quantavious’ trailer and he saw the purple car parked there and he thought, “I’ve got you now, son, I’ve got you now!”

It was a No-knock warrant and they kicked in the door with booted feet and James Earl expected to find the suspect cowering inside, but to his dismay the trailer was empty. Then the K-9 Officer started giving him some crap after once again King didn’t sniff out any drugs inside the trailer, But then the deputy ordered him to have the dog sniff around the outside. When King came to a particular panel of latticework at the back he got very excited and began digging at the base of it.

“See what’s under there,” James Earl instructed the K-9 Officer.

After the K-9 Officer emerged with the drugs from underneath the trailer they had driven to the court house and spent several hours doing the paperwork to get an arrest warrant issued for Carter, charging him with possession of, and with intent to distribute cocaine, methamphetamine and marijuana.

James Earl expected some grueling questions from the sheriff when he got back to the office, but everyone there was in a buzz because it seemed something more important had the sheriff occupied.

“You ain’t heard?” another deputy asked him. “Some slick son-of-a-gun busted into that big old pawn shop in town and stole just about everything in the dang place. They make off with over a hundred handguns, over a thousand rounds of ammo, and they won’t say how much in valuable jewelry.”

“They caught anybody yet?” James Earl asked.

“Ain’t nobody got a clue. Looks like it was done sometime Saturday night. They tunneled in from the back alley, busted through the cement block wall. Looks like whoever is was is fixin’ to get away clean!”

(www.teddunagan.com)