Police Grimly Predict Another Record Year for Cocaine

Giddy with excitement could best describe the California Highway Patrol this week after its officers seized six pounds of cocaine after a routine traffic stop in South-Central Los Angeles. CHP officials even assembled the press to tout their find.

“Maybe six pounds of coke isn’t a lot any more,” a CHP spokesman said, almost apologetically, “but we don’t usually spend our time working narcotics cases. This was a big deal--at least for us.”

Such was the local war on drugs in 1986. Not so long ago, the seizure of six pounds of cocaine would have been big news, film-at-11 material. In a year when area police agencies confiscated more than 1,700 pounds of cocaine in one raid alone, however, six pounds seemed to barely warrant a mention.

The amount of cocaine confiscated in Los Angeles County skyrocketed to a record last year, along with the number of people arrested for possessing or selling it. And there is every indication that 1987 will bring more of the same, predict grim-faced authorities, who differ on the reasons behind the increase.

No Optimism

“There is nothing that would give me reason for optimism that this problem is going to decrease,” said Sheriff Sherman Block.

Cocaine seizures by the Los Angeles Police Department jumped 413% in 1986, with police confiscating 13,171 pounds of the stuff worth an estimated $2.5 billion. Detectives also recovered $29.6 million in cash (up 85% from 1985) and 2,112 guns (up 26%) while making nearly 40,000 narcotics-related arrests--a 15% increase over 1985.

The Sheriff’s Department, meanwhile, recorded a 142% increase in cocaine seizures. Deputies through the first three-quarters of 1986 confiscated 2,801 pounds of cocaine along with 955 firearms, including three machine guns. More than 18,700 people were arrested on drug charges, a 6% increase from the previous year.

Over the last five years, drug-related arrests by the Sheriff’s Department have climbed 73%, most of them cocaine-related, Block noted.

Yet despite stepped-up enforcement, authorities say cocaine in Los Angeles became more available in 1986. The increased supply dropped the price of the drug in many areas, thus making it more affordable to dealers who once peddled less-expensive narcotics, particularly phencyclidine and marijuana.

Other Drugs Dwindle

The amount of those drugs seized by police and sheriff’s investigators dropped dramatically in 1986 as the cocaine market flourished, statistics show.

In mid-1985, a kilogram of cocaine (2.2 pounds) cost an average $40,000 to $42,000 in Los Angeles, Block said. Today, that same amount of cocaine can be purchased for $20,000--less if a dealer buys kilos in quantity.

“More people are becoming involved with the use of the drug,” Block said. “It’s become the drug of choice by an overwhelming percentage. . . . There is a demand out there for it.”

The number of sizeable cocaine busts in Los Angeles last year confirms it:

- Acting on a tip in April, Los Angeles police detectives and U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency investigators confiscated 1,784 pounds of cocaine worth an estimated $500 million in what officials described as the largest cocaine bust in California history. Seven South Americans were arrested at five locations in Orange County; four were eventually convicted.

- Narcotics investigators arrested two men in a North Hollywood parking lot on Dec. 4 and confiscated 1,333 pounds of cocaine valued at $226 million. A Cuban native and a Colombian national were taken into custody, along with $70,000 in cash.

- Twenty-two suspects were rounded up in September and more than 1,000 pounds of cocaine worth an estimated $140 million was seized by investigators from several police agencies carrying out a series of raids in Hawthorne and Sun Valley. Most of those arrested were Colombians.

Profitable Focus

Although Block and others contend that increased demand for the drug explains why so much of it was confiscated in 1986, others in law enforcement say the reason is because recent laws have made it profitable for investigators to focus on often-flashy cocaine dealers.

Federal regulations passed in 1984 allow local agencies the potential of keeping as much as 80% of the assets taken from a suspected drug dealer, including cash, cars, boats, airplanes and even real estate.

“There’s no doubt that it’s increased aggressiveness on law enforcement’s part,” said Beverly Hills Police Sgt. Robert Smith, whose five-man narcotics unit nabbed 67 pounds of cocaine and arrested 33 suspected dealers in 1986. “With the assets, you can go out and buy the equipment you really need to do the job.”

Authorities also attributed the increase in cocaine seizures to increased cooperation between local police investigators and federal agencies, including the Drug Enforcement Agency and FBI.

At drug agency headquarters in Washington, spokesman Robert Feldkamp said the amount of cocaine confiscated by the agency in Los Angeles dropped last year, from 1,720 pounds in 1985 to 1,380 pounds in 1986. Feldkamp said, however, that the decline does not reflect a reduction of cocaine on the street.

“All you have to do is look at local police numbers to know better,” he said.

Last year, the agency filed federal narcotics charges against 944 people in Los Angeles, compared to 892 in 1985, Feldkamp said. Convictions jumped 51%, from 381 to 576.