Looking For iPad, Police Find 750 Pounds of Meth

An anonymous reader writes "Hot on the trail of a stolen iPad using the 'Find my iPad' feature in iOS, Police in San Jose tracked the stolen device back to an apartment complex where they then stumbled onto 750 pounds of meth. All told, the meth is worth about $35 million on the street. The seizure was one of the largest drug busts in recent memory."

Re:Depressing

[bamwham]

Peolple who start using it is an increase to demand. The issue is what are the current users going to do if the price goes up. The addiction is strong enough that the "elastic demand-to-price" assumption is likely unreasonable. Addicts will find a way to pay the higher price, also note that this is a drug for which one can developa chemical dependency with one use. It breaks most of the economic models which were developed to study things like Sugar. It is much closer to the models that were developed to study Oil.

Re:$35 Million Dollars

[kbob88]

The actual lesson is: Criminals are bloody stupid. If I had $35 million worth of drugs in a place, I would avoid doing anything that could get the police into my place. Like stealing an iPad. Or even picking one up that someone left on the train or bus.

They're even stupider than you think. The police didn't have a search warrant, so they just asked if they could come in, and the people in the apartment said yes. Can you believe it? They've got $35mm worth of meth and they invite the cops in? They must have been under the influence of drugs at the time...

By the way, to give credit where credit is due, it was detectives from Palo Alto who found the meth, not San Jose police, although the apartment was in San Jose.

Re:Crime solved when Police do their job, News at

[Anonymous Coward]

I live near a major highway and hear all the time about major drug busts that occurred because less-than-intelligent traffickers got pulled over because of something stupid like speeding.

In the majority of those cases, the officer (or his intel) knew that there was a high probability that the vehicle was hauling drugs. Fortunately, police cannot pull you over based on the intel alone. They have to find a reason to pull you over. Fortunate for the cops, it's absolutely impossible for a human to drive anywhere without committing a violation. Example: The un-posted speed limit of Seattle is 25mph. If you turn onto a 35mph roadway, you can only drive 25mph until you are in view of a 35mph sigh, even if you have prior knowledge that the speed limit is 35. I've seen cases where a van (carrying drugs) was pulled over because their tinted windows were too tinted... At 11PM. On a highway. By four squad cards.
 
Once they have the car pulled over, they are entitled to a plain sight search. They will also try to compel/coerce the driver into consenting to a search. If the driver does not fall to their interrogation, they can release the hounds as a means to circumvent the 5th amendment.
 
It's an interesting game.

Re:Crime solved when Police do their job, News at

[fahrbot-bot]

Well we are assuming the dealer wasn't also an idiot who would risk $35M worth of drugs for an electronic device you can get brand new for $500, $800 tops with all the options.

Don't bet against the stupidity of criminals. From the FBI report on the 1993 World Trade Center Bombing [fbi.gov]:

In the rubble investigators uncovered a vehicle identification number on a piece of wreckage that seemed suspiciously obliterated. A search of our crime records returned a match: the number belonged to a rented van reported stolen the day before the attack. An Islamic fundamentalist named Mohammad Salameh had rented the vehicle, we learned, and on March 4, an FBI SWAT team arrested him as he tried in vain to get his $400 deposit back.