Tales from the Brown Desk - Episode 21 - Marijuana Metabolites, Recording Police Encounters, Record Meth Seizure, & Florida Man

Weekly Criminal Law Podcast, Tales from the Brown Desk, brought to you by Rigney Law LLC. Tales from the Brown Desk is a free flowing conversation involving two foul-mouthed attorneys. It may include graphic descriptions of sexual activity, violence, and traffic law. It may not be suitable for children. Listener discretion advised. 

Episode 21. In this episode, Indianapolis criminal defense attorneys, Jacob Rigney and Kassi Rigney, talk about marijuana metabolites and the law surrounding it, Indiana's recent record seizure of methamphetamine worth $10 Million found on the side of I-70, if it is legal or illegal to record encounters with the police, and the latest Florida Man news.

Transcript

Podcast Transcript

Jacob Rigney - It's Friday afternoon. We've locked the door, but that doesn't matter. Because people still steal stuff from our office, and also because it's time for another edition of our weekly podcast Tales from the Brown Desk. I'm Jake Rigney of Rigney Law LLC. With me as usual as my law partner, wife, and the baby mama with the least drama, Kassi Rigney. The poor soul tasked with deciphering our obscenity laced tirades is Teri Ulm. Friendly reminder, Tales from the Brown Desk is a free-flowing conversation involving two foul-mouthed attorneys. It may include graphic descriptions of sexual activity, violence, and conspiracy theories about the government listening to our publicly available podcast. It's like we don't even want listeners or something. You know. We're like: "Oh no! Someone's listening in Virginia!" That's terrible. It may not be suitable for children, the easily triggered, the hardly breathing, or people with a mouth full of soup. Look at me. Imagining that I might say something funny enough to cause a spit take. Yeah right. Listener discretion is advised. Here's Teri.

Teri Ulm - Hello, everyone! Hi, Jake. How are you today?

Jacob Rigney - I'm in a bad mood, Teri. How are you?

Teri Ulm - Oh Jake. What's a spit take?

Jacob Rigney - That's when you have something in your mouth and somebody says something funny and you spit everything in your mouth out because you can't suppress the laugh.

Teri Ulm - I see. I see. I think there's probably been a couple of those instances that that would have happened if I was drinking while we were doing these podcasts. But anyway, I'm good.

Jacob Rigney - Yeah. We don't let you drink afternoon. All the drinking in this office comes in the morning.

Teri Ulm - Hi, Kassi. How are you?

Kassi Rigney - Hi, Teri. I'm fine.

Teri Ulm - Good. So, last week we concluded our series: A Walk...

Jacob Rigney - It's over.

Teri Ulm - Yeah. It's over. We went through 72 series. Not really 72, but...

Jacob Ringey - How many was it? How many episodes was it?

Teri Ulm - Oh. I don't know. I'd have to go back. But this here will be episode 21 of our podcast.

Jacob Rigney - Right. Episode 20 hasn't aired yet.

Teri Ulm - Right.

Jacob Rigney - But we're recording episode 21.

Teri Ulm - Yeah. We're on top of it. I'm on top of it here. So anyway, we finished our series: A Walk Through the Criminal Justice System in Indiana. And this week we're going to talk about marijuana metabolites and the law surrounding it.

Jacob Rigney - Okay.

Teri Ulm - But before we begin, we have a listener question.

Jacob Rigney - Oh boy! I love listener questions.

Is it Legal or Illegal to Record Encounters with the Police?

Teri Ulm - I do too. So Chris from Chicago wants to know if it is legal or illegal to record encounters with the  police? And these encounters would be... It's whether they're her encounters or she sees an encounter from afar.

Jacob Rigney - Yeah. In Indiana, and I think everywhere, but definitely in Indiana, it is legal to record both your interactions with the police, and other interactions with the police that you can see if they're happening in public. Now, you don't have the right to take your camera and go into the police station and record what they're doing in the police station necessarily, but out in public, I believe you have a first amendment right to record what they're doing. And you can record every bit of your interaction with them. And they're supposed to get in trouble if they prevent you from doing that. Now there have been plenty of instances where they have. And in fact sometimes the police just arrest the media when they're doing stuff like that.

Teri Ulm - I've seen that.

Jacob Rigney - So the rules are one thing. How you enforce them sometimes is a different story. But it's not illegal to record them.

Kassi Rigney - No. This comes back around having that fight on the street. As we've seen people where there are stories where the media was arrested. That person, the person being arrested, you're not going to win that fight with the police. And unfortunately because they're the trained legal authority with the guns. You're probably going to get hurt if you try and have that fight on the street. That that's the kind of thing that you want to bring to court after the fact. That's the appropriate place to have that fight.

Teri Ulm - So my takeaway from there and from a lot of these podcasts is: you can fight the police, but you do it in court with a trained attorney that knows how to do that.

Jacob Rigney - Yeah. Look. Most people haven't been in the army and most of the people who have don't want to go back. Fighting dudes with guns or women with guns... I always say dudes with guns and it sounds misogynistic. I shouldn't say that. Fighting the trained people with the guns is just not a good idea. Running from them isn't a great idea either. Although that must work sometimes. It does. You can tell that it works sometimes because people keep doing it. I've probably mentioned that before. It's the same with shoplifting. You wonder why people who steal still get caught shoplifting after all these years, and it's because some people get away with it. But, yeah. Look. Nothing that's going to happen to you that night is worth taking a beating or potentially risking your life over. And that includes when I say this: I'm including the ones where the police did something wrong and the ones where they didn't do anything wrong. Because there are instances of both in this country happening. I'm not going to say every day, but quite probably every day. Somewhere in this country the police are doing something wrong. And somewhere in this country people are doing something wrong to the police. Both of those instances can end up with people being dead. And none of it is worth your life over. So absolutely wait. Fight it out in court later. That's what you got to do. It reminds me of a really funny thing one of my clients said to a police officer once while he was getting arrested, but I don't talk about my cases so I can't tell you what he said. But yeah. There's no sense in fighting it out with them. There is no sense in risking your life or your health over that sort of thing. There just isn't.

Kassi Rigney - And frankly, it kind of puts you in bad light when you end up in court and they're telling the story. Even when you're in the right, the law does not allow you the legal authority to make those objections. Orderly society doesn't work if they did allow everybody to do that. So not only are you never going to win, but it kind of casts you in a bit of a negative light when you do end up in court.

The Castle Doctrine and No Knock Warrants Collide

Jacob Rigney - But just to give you an idea of how difficult it is or how the legislature makes this worse, sometimes they don't always make it better. Sometimes they make it worse. One example is not too long ago it was five or ten years ago, they changed the self-defense statute and they added to the Castle Doctrine. The Castle Doctrine is essentially a doctrine that says if you're in your house and someone's trying to come into your house, you can use deadly force to repel them. And so that way, if you think the person's coming in to rape your daughter or kill your wife, you can kill them. You don't need to wait and find out what they're doing. You don't have to wait for them to get inside. You don't have to ask them about what their intentions are. You can just kill them. So they changed. They added some things to the Castle Doctrine and made it okay to use deadly force on the police if they're invading your house. As long as it's not appropriate. How you'd ever figure that out is beyond me, but some people will read that statute and say: "Well that means now I can shoot the police if they're coming into my house".

Kassi Rigney - This is an interesting topic because it brings us to the Breonna Taylor situation. And this is something that's a Kentucky law issue. But in the state of Indiana, you cannot assert self-defense if you're in the wrong. And it's my understanding in that case. The police were in the wrong place, even though it was under the guise of a search warrant. They were not in the place authorized by the search warrant, and it confuses me as to how the grand jury found they were justified in self-defense. Because at least in Indiana, when you're not on solid legal ground, you cannot assert self-defense.

Jacob Rigney - So the law... I actually saw this discussed kind of intelligently on the internet. Believe it or not.

Teri Ulm - Wow.

Jacob Rigney - Right. It was the only intelligent discussion happening anywhere in the internet that day. Where there are these two different laws, certainly both passed by the legislature that create these sort of conflicting issues. One is the Castle Doctrine. I can defend my house from invaders with deadly force. And the other is no knock warrants. The police can get no knock warrants where they don't have to knock. They don't have to announce. They can just show up, bust indoors, and arrest people. And they can come any time they want. The middle of the night, if they want to. Now, if I don't have to wait till they get inside to shoot the people invading my house, then you've got this conflict where one person reasonably thinks he can defend himself, because of the Castle Doctrine. The police think that they're allowed to go in without announcing, without knocking, and just start knocking heads. And there are always going to be these kinds of issues as long as those two separate laws, those two separate doctrines, exist. There will never be a time where we don't have the police trying to do no knock warrants, or people trying to defend themselves mistakenly believing that their house is being broken into. It's gonna happen as long as they keep letting these sorts of things happen.

Teri Ulm - So do those two laws apply to Indiana?

Jacob Rigney - Yes. Yeah. You can get a no knock warrant in Indiana. You have to have reasonable articulable  grounds for it in addition to the warrant. It's not just that you can get a warrant. You have to have some reason to believe that that particular defendant will be, or that particular house will be defended with deadly force, or is occupied by violent people who've said they're gonna hurt the police or something like that. Something to lead the judge to believe that it's necessary. But yes. You can get a no knock warrant in Indiana, and the Castle Doctrine exists in Indiana. So, on a long enough timeline you're going to see that in Indiana sometime too. Where the police try to come with a no knock warrant and somebody tries to defend themselves not knowing it's the police.

Indiana's Record $10 Million Meth Seizure off I-70 in Putnam County

Teri Ulm - Now before we jump into the topic of the day I wanted to talk about Indiana's recent record $10 million dollar meth seizure. Yeah. So, News Channel 13 reports that a record seizure of methamphetamine for Indiana happened by chance when a traveler found $10 million dollars worth of the drug on the side of I-70 in Putnam County. The DEA says someone found six green and blue duffel bags in the grass and alerted police. It's reported that the bags contain 225 pounds of meth.

Jacob Rigney - Right.

Teri Ulm - Like who's leaving... This kind of confuses me. I don't know if you had the means to buy $10 million dollars worth of meth, like would that be a drop-off point to change?

Kassi Rigney - This sounds clearly like it fell off the truck. I mean it's the same as there was a time around  Indianapolis that I think some department of public works people found a tire that had like $60,000 or $80  thousand dollars in cash in it. Now technically that should... I mean they're working. And so of course this. They get it. Not their employers. I thought good for them. But at the same time, I could have picked up the money and split it, whatever. But that was obviously drug money. No they don't. That's not a drop off point. That's a mistake. Mistakes happen.

Teri Ulm - Now in our last episode we talked about how Indiana was on the cutting edge regarding sensible laws when it came to expungements.

Jacob Rigney - Yeah.

Indiana Marijuana Laws are Among the Harshest in the Nation

Teri Ulm - However, Indiana's marijuana laws are among the harshest in the nation.

Jacob Rigney - Yep. 

Teri Ulm - And we're going to talk about one aspect of that law, and that has to do with marijuana metabolites.

Jacob Rigney - Okay.

What are Marijuana Metabolites?

Teri Ulm - What are marijuana metabolites?

Jacob Rigney - Marijuana metabolites are what ends up in your blood and urine and the other cells of your body. Usually the fat cells of your body after your liver processes the chemicals that you've ingested when you take marijuana. So, if you smoke marijuana, it goes into your lungs then into your bloodstream then into your brain and makes you feel however it makes you feel. Depends on the person. Some people get paranoid. Some people get super happy. Some people get hungry. And while it's doing that in your blood, it's also going through your liver, and your liver is turning it into less poisonous substances that your body can handle more easily, and that are less likely to make you go to Taco Bell. So the trouble, and this is where the sort of common misconception about how long marijuana stays in your system comes from. The trouble is, is that your body breaks those down into metabolites and the metabolites stay in your system for quite a while. But that's what the metabolites are. It's the thing that your liver breaks THC down into.

Is it Illegal to have Marijuana Metabolites in your Body in Indiana?

Teri Ulm - Now is it illegal in the state of Indiana to have those metabolites in your body? Let's say that Chad was visiting a neighboring state like Illinois where recreational marijuana is legal, and he partook, and then he came back to Indiana. Is he breaking any laws with having this in his system?

Kassi Rigney - Just walking on the street, no. There's no kind of possession by consumption. There's potentially with alcohol, but it would be illegal if he got behind the wheel. Just to be a human walking around like that, no. But it is illegal to have metabolite in your system while you are operating a vehicle.  

Teri Ulm - So let's say Chad lived in Illinois. Has been smoking marijuana every day for the last six months. Moves to Indiana.

Jacob Rigney - Bad idea, Chad.

Teri Ulm - Moves to Indiana. Hasn't partaken.

Jacob Rigney - Unless he needs an expungement. Then it's a good idea. But if he's just been smoking a lot of weed, it's a bad idea, Chad.

Teri Ulm - Say then he moves to Indiana, and he knows it's against the law here so he's not partaking at all. And he gets behind a wheel.

Jacob Rigney - I like the part where you imagine that a marijuana smoker in Illinois is like: "Well. I live in Indiana now. I guess I better stop smoking weed".

Teri Ulm - This is a little hypothetical here.

Jacob Rigney - Right.

Teri Ulm - Well he's a law abiding citizen.

Jacob Rigney - Sure.

Driving with Marijuana Metabolites in your System is Against the Law in Indiana

Teri Ulm - It's legal there, so he's doing it. It's illegal here, so he's not going to do it. But like a week or two went by  and he hops in a car and he's driving down the road. Is he breaking the law?

Jacob Rigney - Probably Yeah.

Kassi Rigney - If it remains in his blood in a system, yes.

Jacob Rigney - Yeah. And it's anywhere in his body, not just in his blood. So the thing about marijuana is that it can be stored. The metabolites end up stored in your fat cells for a long time. If you are a regular smoker, it will stay in your system for not just a month. We're talking sometimes two, three, four, maybe even six months if you smoke a lot every day. If you smoke it once and only once, it probably doesn't stay in your system for a month. Although it depends on some other things too. Like how much fat you have in your body, and how much you work out, how  much water you drink. But even, then it's probably going to stay in your system for between ten days and three weeks. And if you are driving with metabolite anywhere in your body, including in your fat cells, and in your urine, you're breaking the law in Indiana.

Teri Ulm - Wow.

Jacob Rigney - Yeah. They made a law that just says if you drive with schedule one metabolites in your system, anywhere, it's a misdemeanor. It's in the DUI statute.

You Don't have to be Intoxicated or High to be Charged with an OWI or DUI in Indiana.

Teri Ulm - So you don't actually have to be intoxicated to be charged with operating while intoxicated?

Jacob Rigney - Nope. Nope. And, in fact, they don't even call it operating while intoxicated. They call it operating with a metabolite in your body. But it's in the OWI statute, and it's enhanceable if you have a prior OWI So, if you have a prior DUI, even if it's for alcohol or something else, within the previous seven years, then operating with that metabolite in your body is a felony.

Kassi Rigney - And it's one of those they try to make a distinction, because it's only a C misdemeanor. Which is 0 to 60 days in jail. But you can get probation for up to 365 days on that. And that's kind of standard operating procedure. So, it almost doesn't even matter whether you get charged with the endangerment. You're actually intoxicated driving in a way that endangers people. Or the C misdemeanor, because it still comes along with you have to do substance abuse evaluation and treatment. You have to go to the impact panel. There's very likely to be a driver's license suspension involved. So even though it's a C misdemeanor v. an A misdemeanor, though the effect in the end, is looks much more like the A.

Teri Ulm - So what kind of situation would Chad have to be in to not smoke weed that day, but still have to submit to some type of blood test?

Kassi Rigney - I think we've talked about before. When you're operating in the state of Indiana, whether you're operating or hold a driver's license, you've already agreed to the state to some things. One is the refusal statute. So if there's probable cause, if they think you're intoxicated, doesn't have to be alcohol, then the officer can ask for it when you could get it there. But also if you're involved in an accident with a serious bodily injury, all drivers are tested. Period. It doesn't have to be your fault. All drivers are tested, and then in that case you could be driving... Somebody could do something crazy, and you just failed to avoid the accident. Even if you were acting as safely as someone  could have in that situation, they'll take your blood. And if you've got metabolite in it, then you you could get charged. And I've seen that done. When they knew the accident was not caused by that person. I think it's really just an end, and around, trying to get people who they couldn't catch smoke and pot any other way.

Teri Ulm - Right.

Jacob Rigney - Right. This is what happens when you elect politicians who say they're gonna be tough on drug crime. Like I'm Bill O'keefe and I'm going be tough on crime. And you don't realize that what they're saying is they're gonna make it illegal to drive a car if you've smoked weed in the last two months.

Teri Ulm - That's crazy.

Jacob Rigney - Right. Because that's what tougher on crime means these days. We have plenty of laws. We send plenty of people to prison already. But nobody ever gets elected for saying they're going to be softer on crime. So people run on I'm going to be tougher on crime, and then they got to do something. So they make these laws that people don't wouldn't normally expect or don't even know are illegal. And here's another weird thing about it. And I don't know if a police officer's actually figured this out or not, but if you're a police officer,, you pull someone over and you see that they've been arrested for marijuana in the last month, you have probable cause.

Kassi Rigney - Don't give them ideas.

Jacob Rigney - Because they probably still have metabolite in their system, right.

Teri Ulm - Yeah.

Jacob Rigney - So now you have probable cause to draw their blood, go get a warrant, draw their blood, arrest them.

Marion County Prosecutor Charging for Marijuana Metabolites.

Teri Ulm - So last year the Marion County prosecutor stated that he will no longer prosecute simple marijuana possession cases. So would having marijuana metabolite in your system in Marion County classify as a simple marijuana possession case or are prosecutors in Marion County charging people with this?

Kassi Rigney - No. Because he's talking about possession marijuana. He's talking about having a joint in your pocket there. That's different than getting behind a wheel. Because what people say is I'm driving. I wasn't high. It's a deadly weapon. And they take it very seriously. They're not passing on OWIs for metabolite. That's not... Possession is a different offense. And that's not what he was referring to when he made that statement.

Jacob Rigney - Right. And the thing you have to remember about him is, and by the way, I know the Marion County prosecutor. We worked in the same office for a while. But one of the things you got to remember is that it's an elected position, right. And if they start refusing to prosecute people who are behind the wheel with metabolite in their system, and then one of them goes out and kills someone, it's going to make really bad news. And he doesn't want really bad news like that. So it's highly unlikely that they would pass on a prosecution like that. I will say though, the vast majority of people who commit this crime, get away with it. Because the police don't have probable cause to search your body. Most of the time. If you have drugs in your car, then they might. Especially if you have used marijuana, like a joint or a roach, or something in your car, they might have probable cause. But most the time when people get pulled over, they get a ticket or a warning, and they get let go. Because the police don't have probable cause to do anything but that. And if they find it, they will.

Kassi Rigney - Well and what I've seen coming out of Marion County, obviously my sample size is small, if the possession is attached to other crimes, they're still adding it. It's got to be a true straight possession of marijuana. I was a drug prosecutor in Marion County for a long time, and the kind of thing is we've got big problems. There's a lot of murderer. There's big-time drug dealers. There's meth dealers. As you see about 26 pounds just on the side of the road. There's stuff going on out there. So it was kind of the thought process there was if you're not bothering  anybody, and you want to smoke a joint, have your Doritos, stay at home. We're not going to bother you. We have we got bigger fish to fry kind of thing.

Jacob Rigney - Yeah. I don't smoke weed, but I do love Doritos. Is that weird.

Teri Ulm - No.

Kassi Rigney - But that's where the thought process was. I was glad they took it to the public step after I left. But it was kind of and why are we messing. They were getting diversions on this stuff anyway. You're smoking weed. You're not bothering anybody. We've got bigger things to do.

The Effect Based Approach - Prosecutors Must Prove Drug Impairment.

Teri Ulm - So from my understanding, from researching this prior to to this episode, was that most states in the United States don't have this law. They have a different approach. 

Jacob Rigney - You know more about that than we do, Teri.

Kassi Rigney - What is that approach?

Teri Ulm - The approach is called the effect based approach by which prosecutors must prove that the drug impaired the driver's ability to operate the motor vehicle.

Jacob Rigney - Right. And that's similar to the way Indiana's laws work for alcohol, DUI. It's not illegal to have two beers and drive your car as long as the two beers don't put you over .08 and you're not impaired. But that impairment element does not exist in the metabolite statute.

Kassi Rigney, I would say that probably because there's no marijuana lobby keeping that out there. What the alcohol people were probably like: "Look, man. It's still legal to drink. You got to prove something". You can have alcohol, but there's no... I'm not sure that there's a strong marijuana lobby.

Jacob Rigney - There is a marijuana lobby. They exist. But their focus right now is on legalization and medical. It's not on fixing other stupid laws very much. And so Indiana's got this law. I guess I shouldn't call it stupid, but it's the law.

Teri Ulm - I think it's stupid.

Jacob Rigney - I think it's ill-advised. But they certainly don't have anybody like Coors or Budweiser trying to talk the legislature out of it, because there's nobody like that that stands to make that much money in Indiana over a law like that.

Teri Ulm - So if our listeners out there, specifically the Indiana residents, that think this law is not a sound one, what can they do to help reform the law?

Jacob Rigney - Look. You can start a PAC or a super PAC. Or you can call your legislators and talk to them about it. But that's really all you can do. It's the legislators that do it. And you can guess where that falls on the political spectrum. It's mostly going to be conservatives who don't really understand the dynamics of marijuana consumption, who fought CBD for so long before they finally made it legal, and who always stand up against legalization. They're the same people who are going to stand up that way. They're gonna say this is how we catch people who get stoned and drive. Never minding the fact that they catch many more people who aren't stoned and driving, and make them criminals. Which is a shame.

Kassi Rigney - And the thing is that you hear a lot of the negative. Oh well. Then what are you going to do about DUI if you make it legal. Well the thing is, you can get picked up on marijuana intoxication, OWI, as the current law is written. That argument against it is starting to go by the wayside because it's just not the reality. Because you can get an OWI for prescription drugs. You get for marijuana. So the fact that it would be available recreationally, doesn't rid that the fear that you're just going to have a bunch of stoners all over the road now is just not realistic.

Jacob Rigney - Right. The day they make it legal, everyone's just going to get high, get in the car, and plow into your grandma. That's not what's going to happen. Although, I will say, I visited Las Vegas recently, and it's legal there. And it is everywhere. The strip has gotten almost like family unfriendly at this point by how much open-air marijuana smoking is going on. I would not feel comfortable letting my daughter walk around the strip. They used to market Vegas as it being kind of family friendly. It was a place for... It's not.

Kassi Rigney - Well and I find that interesting because I've been to Amsterdam a few times, and what you describe is worse than any experience I've had actually in the red light district. I think you have adults doing adult things in Amsterdam, and you have children running wild with their newfound freedom.

Jacob Rigney - That is sort of the classic argument for why it ought to be regulated. So that you can keep it more like Amsterdam and less like Las Vegas. But so far, especially in Indiana, you  haven't seen any serious push in that direction. There are people talking about it, but I don't think that we're anywhere near getting any kind of legalization. They'll probably wait till the feds legalize. Even then they might not. I mean look, it's still illegal to drink in some counties in Kentucky.

Teri Ulm - To drink in Kentucky?

Jacob Rigney - Yeah. There are dry counties in Kentucky where you cannot purchase alcohol.

Teri Ulm - Don't move to Kentucky people. So now we are going to cut to a short commercial break and when we come back we will bring you the latest Florida Man news.

Florida Man Brought to you by Sonos Home Audio.

Jacob Rigney - Today's update on Florida Man is brought to you by Sonos home audio. We love our Sonos home audio equipment, and we miss it very much since it got stolen.

Kassi Rigney - Seriously. Someone stole the music speakers! Now my heart hurts and I have nothing to sooth the pain except for whiskey and high potency prescription opioids. This will surely end well.

Jacob Rigney - Seriously. The new radicals used to say that the music was in me. But it's not. It's in my Sonos speakers, and they are gone. And I cannot process my feelings about this. I mean I might even call the cops. That's how awesome my speakers are. This message not actually brought to you by Sonos. Unless they send us new speakers for free, in which case, this message was totally brought to you by Sonos. 

Teri Ulm - Now Florida Man. There's just a couple stories out of Florida this week.

Jacob Rigney - Oh good.

Florida Man Who Stole Cat Blood is on the Loose.

Teri Ulm - The first one's really odd. ABC News 2 in Florida reports that deputies are searching for Florida Man who stole cat blood. Yeah. Florida Man.

Jacob Rigney - Okay. What's that good for?

Teri Ulm - I don't know.

Kassi Rigney - Witchcraft obviously.

Jacob Rigney - Voodoo. Some sort of voodoo spell requiring cat blood. Where do you get cat blood from?

Teri Ulm - The veterinarian clinic.

Kassi Rigney - Yeah. He broke in to steal cat blood.

Jacob Rigney - Sorry. I wasn't really paying attention. I was still thinking about my Sonos speakers.

Teri Ulm - Yeah. Florida Man broke into a veterinarian clinic, and was checking out this box. A blood box. And then we he was seen on surveillance footage 20 minutes later putting the box into his truck. The box contained four blood vials of cat blood that amounted to $600 loss for the clinic. 

Kassi Rigney - They didn't get any ketamine or any of the other drugs?

Jacob Rigney - The cat blood has a dollar value?

Teri Ulm - Yes. Four vials, $600 bucks.

Jacob Rigney - What?

Kassi Rigney - So do they run cat blood drives somewhere?

Teri Ulm -  I'm not aware.

Jacob Rigney - When he was arrested, did they book him under the name Count Kitullah? Count Catchula? Is he a cat vampire? 

Teri Ulm - He might be. I'm not sure.

Jacob Rigney - Does he have a vampire cat?

Teri Ulm - He might. Didn't try to just... Instead of that meow mix or something.

Jacob Rigney - Next week our Florida Man should be brought to you by your local black market cat blood dealer. 

Florida Man Arrested for Drugs After Trying to Blame a Homeless Guy.

Teri Ulm - Now, NBC 2 out of Florida reports that Florida Man was arrested after trying to blame drugs on a homeless guy. 

Jacob Rigney - Yeah.

Teri Ulm - Yeah. Florida Man was arrested after he told deputies that a backpack containing drugs belonged to a  homeless man that he had given a ride earlier in the day. He told the deputies that he dropped the homeless man off at the 7-Eleven and he knew he was homeless and a drug user. The deputies say they watched Florida Man drive by the 7-Eleven earlier without letting anyone out of his car. Florida Man was pulled over for an expired license plate, and the car he was driving was searched. After the canine was alerted to the vehicle, Florida Man described the homeless man as tall slender man, wearing a blue shirt, and khaki shorts. Florida Man was a tall slender man, wearing a blue shirt, and khaki shorts. 

Jacob Rigney - He described himself as the is the culprit?

Teri Ulm - Down to the color of the clothes that he had on.

Jacob Rigney - It sounds like me most the time when I go to the golf course, but I did not have a backpack full of drugs, ever.

Teri Ulm - Deputies uncovered a large knife, a hatchet, a backpack containing pills, and a scale, over 28 grams of meth, cocaine, and nearly 8 grams of fentanyl. That's all according to the arrest report.

Jacob Rigney - I love the choice for the hatchet. That is a good high quality weapon of choice when you're a drug dealer with priors.

Kassi Rigney - I'm sorry. If you got enough money to be holding that kind of weight, you're not homeless. And even if you found it, that's your worldly possessions. You're not leaving them some rando's car.

Teri Ulm - No.

Kassi Rigney - One of the the basic rules of committing crimes, don't commit two crimes at once. You're driving around, you hear about the traffic stop for an out headlight, and they find marijuana in your trunk. I mean, fix the headlight. Get your registration if you plan to commit crimes in this vehicle. They don't have a school. Criminal activity 101. 

Jacob Rigney - They should. We could teach it.

Kassi Rigney - Hey. Maybe we should make a new section to the podcast. 

Jacob Rigney - ITT Tech should teach how to get away with crimes. That should be a major there.

Teri Ulm - Didn't they go out of business?

Jacob Rigney - Criminal activity. You can get your degree in paralegal criminal activity, clerk medical professional, or automotive.

Teri Ulm - That's all the time we have for today. 

Jacob Rigney - Thanks, Teri. And thank you listeners for listening to Tales from the Brown Desk. Please remember, while we may discuss legal issues and provide information regarding the law to our listeners, we do not intend to create an attorney-client relationship with any listener. Our advice may not be applicable to some legal issues. Please consult with an attorney you've hired to review your legal situation before you attempt to apply the things we have said to your case. Tales from the Brown Desk is produced by Rigney Law and edited by Teri Ulm. If you want to ask a listener question email Teri at teri@rigneylawindy.com, and entitle your email "Podcast Question" and we'll read it on our next podcast unless we start getting too many questions, but we never do, because no one likes us. But if we did, we'd only read the good questions. Buzzsprout says we have 40 listeners now.

Teri Ulm - Come back!

Jacob Rigney - It almost doubled in two weeks. Our numbers have me very confused. They go up and down  more wildly than my mood swings, and I am bipolar. I have an update on last week's Ashburn, Virginia situation. Our podcast now has five downloads from Ashburn. This can only mean one thing. The government listener has escalated our monitoring up the chain of command. So that the NSA and FBI can get involved. If you never hear from us again, we've likely been renditioned to a black site in Nicaragua. Our newest faraway listener is from West Palm Beach, Florida. 

Teri Ulm - Florida picked us up.

Jacob Rigney - It's a Florida Man. Florida is on to us. We are in trouble now.

Teri Ulm - Could he file a lawsuit for defamation?

Jacob Rigney - No. Because we have... Well he could He can file whatever he wants, but he would not likely succeed because we have not identified any person in particular. It's always just Florida Man.

Kassi Rigney - What if his name is Chad and he's from Florida?

Jacob Rigney - Well it's a good thing that I've got a disclaimer here at the end. The attorneys at Rigney Law do not comment on their current pending cases. Nothing we've said in this podcast is a comment on a case we're currently working on, even if your name is Chad or if you're a Florida Man who plans to steal our speakers  while you're not wearing any pants. Thanks, everyone. Bye.