Roanoke's Special Street Crimes Unit

We are going to have to surveillance Teams I'll be in an unmarked car in the Home Depot lot. Lancaster will be in unmarked vehicle in plain clothes. We'll have three take down teams, Sgt. Hartsen along with Mr. Carlin are going to be in shot 206.

Roanoke's Street Crimes unit is about to go to work. The four man, one woman team and K-9 Calas, will spend this day searching for drug dealers -- in the parking lot of the Home Depot, where the drug trade blends into the daily activity.

Watch as John rides along with the Street Crimes unit

They've made 10-15 arrests here in the past six months. They are here because Home Depot has asked for their help.

After a couple of hours of what Hartsen calls "fishing" we get a bite -- Two rental cars at the store, whose drivers seem to have no interest in home improvement.

The team follows them to a strip mall, where the occupants go into a pizza restaurant. The Street Crimes unit closes in.

Hey guys, Lancaster just called me and said one of the guys keeps looking out towards the vehicle, just eyeballing it real hard. Y'all ready to come in?

Two uniformed officers go inside the restaurant to watch the suspects, while Calas sniffs for drugs...

Natural sound -- Sniffing then show Bill shaking his head no...

He doesn't find any.

The unit feels sure the cars and suspects are tied to drug activity, but with no further evidence they must to move on. The emphasis shifts to other known drug areas.

These three men have a history in the drug trade.

These are guys that we're familiar with, have a pretty good rapport with them.
These guys here uh, usually always have several hundred dollars on them at a time. None of them work.

The dog searches the car, and finds a trace of marijuana.
Cause the dog was, he was hitting down there underneath the glove box...and that's where "this" was.

A citation for possession of marijuana... And the unit moves on.

Minutes they spot a man wanted for failing to appear in court. He runs and the units Calos finds the man trying to get into the back door of a locked house. He denied he was the man police were looking for. He's carrying marijuana, and his arm bears the tattoo, LTP for Lincoln Terrace Posse... A local gang.

Hartsen says Roanoke’s gangs are mostly for show.

Are there gangs? I don't know. They are in the beginning stages. If they got organized it could be a huge problem, but I don't think it's that big a problem.

Within minutes police are tailing a blue cavalier with a woman inside. They suspect she just bought crack cocaine.

When they ran her license she showed up as a missing person in Tennessee... So they pulled her over.

Sgt: "Crack pipe" unrolling tissue

See that right there? Yeah. That's crack. I'm going to pull it out.

Police do a field test...

Hartsen: All you do is take a small sample of the product...put it in there...see how small the amount, should be enough to test it.

It's all about color. Police have a saying: "pink over blue, bad for you."

Go to the next tube...pop it...agitate it. See the blue? Blue and pink? That's bad for you, means she goes to jail. That means it's positive for crack cocaine.

This woman will go to jail... And the street crimes unit returns to the streets.