Undercover Cop, 22, Poses As High School Student For 8 Months

Twelve students at Exeter Union High School in central California were arrested this week for selling drugs on campus. But it wasn't a teacher, principal, or member of the local police department who busted the teens -- it was a 22-year-old undercover officer who had befriended the students while posing as a high school student.

Operating under the moniker "Johnny Ramirez," the young officer had recently graduated from the Tulare-Kings Police Academy when he was recruited to go undercover by the local police chief. Many students were surprised to find that 'Johnny,' who had been a presence on campus since the school year began in September, wasn't just another Exeter student.

A 17-year-old senior told the Visalia Times-Delta: "I sat next to Johnny Ramirez in three classes. We really got to know each other. I can't believe it."

The Visalia Times-Delta reports that police are still looking for one student connected with the drug bust, who allegedly hadn't been to school in weeks. The student would make the 13th arrest by the undercover drug offical.

Although this is the first undercover operation to take place at Exeter Union High School, the same tactic has been used before at other schools in the Tulare County.

In an even more bizarre recent story of an undercover operation at a high school, a teenage boy fell in love with who he thought was a teenage girl at a South Florida high school. She was in fact an undercover cop posing as a student as part of a marijuana sting operation. And in the entertainment world, "21 Jump Street" -- a comedy starring Jonah Hill and Channing Tatum as undercover bike cops involved in a high school drug bust -- comes out in theatres today.

Comments

[ifquilt]

01:44 PM on 04/12/2012

I love it! Pay attention dummies. You are at school to learn, not to deal drugs. Otherwise stay home and homeschool. This is fricken hilarious!

[theaetetus]

01:45 AM on 03/22/2012

narcs not ok. snitches get stitches. unless its a tv musical then its cool.

[bluejayrecovery]

01:03 PM on 03/21/2012

Wow is all i can say i dont think i am ok with this

[mmmstewart]

12:48 PM on 03/20/2012

this is a dumb-ass move by the police. You're costing tax payers $ - over Pot!!

wtf - spend your time catching pedophiles or people committing identity theft - or Drunk drivers

no wonder kids/adults don't trust police - now they're stuck w/a permanent record,which a young male student who was targeted by female cop (posing as student) found out the hard way when he chose not to buy drugs for her - But She Pressured Him - entrapment anyone? and then lost his chance to become a police officer. The law is upside down - and our kids are suffering.

[mumi009]

07:53 AM on 03/20/2012

"21 Jump Street" was a TV drama (!) series that aired from 1987 to 1991 starring, among others, Johnny Depp. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0092312/

In it, Depp and others posed as teen students and infiltrated high schools.

I don't know if there was a compelling reason to place an undercover agent in a school. I do think spying on anyone is wrong. It reminds me of stories I heard about life in Hitler Germany and later in Communist East Germany. Your colleague at work, your neighbor, your friend, could all be working for the Gestapo, Stasi, or more up to date, Dept. of Homeland Security.

The year 1984 has come and gone. But the spirit is all too present.

[rtgmath]

10:57 AM on 03/19/2012

Police using this tactic spread distrust among students. They learn they can't even trust each other. They cannot trust the police. The police will try to lure them into doing something wrong so they can hurt them. They cannot trust teachers or any authority ....

And we wonder about what is going wrong in the schools?

Yes, there are criminals amongst the children in the schools. The criminals are children who have been recruited themselves and need a way out. It helps no one to criminalize these kids who get caught up in the web of adult crime. They need help getting out of it.

But the police aren't there to help. They are there to bust. And children's lives are irreparably broken by their actions when, with some compassion and guidance, the children could be saved from these predators.

Our society has its values backwards.

[mdh461]

12:19 PM on 03/19/2012

If you cant do the time, dont do the crime.

[rtgmath]

05:01 PM on 03/19/2012

Sure. Good thing to tell kids. So some adult is pressuring them, they have no help, and that is all you give them? That is about as effective as telling someone who is hungry to get something to eat -- when they have no way to get it and you won't give anything. Kids need help.

[goldgoose]

02:50 AM on 03/19/2012

So an undercover policeman lived a lie for 8 months, betraying the trust of seemingly fellow high school students, including innocent students, for the purpose of arresting 12 adolescent student pot dealers and without arresting the actual pot suppliers. This happened in the State of California where medical pot is legal.
The adolescent dealers now have a stained character and criminal record for the rest of their life and the suppliers need only recruit new dealers from school students in need of some cash.
I have known police to deliberately avoid arresting known dealers because they were only interested in eliminating suppliers and surveillance of dealers is the best way to find suppliers; makes sense to me.
Seems to me that innocent students would not defend student dealers BUT NEITHER WOULD THEY WANT TO EVER CONFIDE IN A POLICE OFFICER BECAUSE THE POLICE PROVED THEY ARE NOT BE TRUSTED OR TO BE HONEST.
I wonder what's the cost to the taxpayers for the arrest of 12 student pot dealers. How much tax money it is going to take to convict the 12 and what's the cost for their incarceration in overcrowded State prisons AND noting that California taxpayers cannot afford to adequately finance the public schools and pay teachers today. Holy crap!
What is the lesson for the 12 convicted students; must they go through life without respectable employment because of their criminal record? Holy crap!

[mdh461]

12:20 PM on 03/19/2012

Yep the old blame game. Get over it

[ifquilt]

01:46 PM on 04/12/2012

Spoken like a true rebel. It's not fair to the good kids at school to have to study amongst drug dealers. Not cool. Keep the drugs out of school and out of work. Deal out of your home if you must. Good luck with that too. Cameras are always watching.

[Kriggens]

09:02 PM on 03/18/2012

The comments here show a disturbing mentality. If a child bought drugs at school and died, you all would be screaming for the heads of the school's admin & teachers. But, apply preventative measures, arrest the teenage criminals that are selling the drugs and you complain? Talk about misplaced blame. You either want a safe environment for your kids or you don't. Creating a safe environment means addressing the drug and gang problem that plagues many of our schools, especially in the cities. As for the "it's not hurting anyone" whiners, you don't know what you're talking about. A student high on who-knows-what, or stoned out of their minds, does not make progress in their courses that are essential for graduation. You can try to make excuses and insist that it's not true, but any teacher will tell you that your out of line. A chemically influenced brain is not a learning brain. Buy a clue folks, be responsible, and take the consequences for illegal actions.

[zzjammin]

06:46 PM on 03/19/2012

the arrests were for pot... if it was cocaine or meth (and if there was a history of drug abuse at the school) then this type of behavior may be okay
but the kids who want to do drugs will do drugs! simple as that... people want to blame the school or the society or whatever, but if they actually sat their children down and taught them about drugs the children wouldn't be influenced by peers as much and would make the decision themselves
and its a fact that some children are born into this criminal lifestyle and some of those children never leave it behind... you cannot help them, only try to limit the number of children born into that world... treat the disease, not the symptoms

[ifquilt]

01:48 PM on 04/12/2012

I don't want the disease sitting next to my good kid at school that is trying to learn, and instead has to hear inapproriate conversation next to them in class. Not cool.

[RMForbes]

02:08 PM on 03/18/2012

The so called small government conservatives that love this authoritarian government intervention are nothing but hypocrites.

[Mark Knudsen]

01:45 PM on 03/18/2012

cops have no business in schools....neither do drug dealers..take your pick

[RMForbes]

02:10 PM on 03/18/2012

That is a false choice. End the failed war on drugs and then the drug dealers disappear.

[Mark Knudsen]

05:19 PM on 03/18/2012

but the use continues and the results continue...dahhhhhh..the old vikng...I just read were a toy wass taken of the market because two children died from using it...how man children have died from drugs this month...????

[mdh461]

12:21 PM on 03/19/2012

Oh yes we do, what ya gonna do when they come for you?

[Mark Knudsen]

12:45 PM on 03/19/2012

invite them in for cookies and milk

[howardmoon]

01:27 PM on 03/18/2012

Narcs!

[mdh461]

12:21 PM on 03/19/2012

Thanks again for all the information you gave us.

[Bunny Tickle Britches]

01:26 PM on 03/18/2012

Meanwhile, the real criminals out on the street are having a good laugh...

[ifquilt]

01:52 PM on 04/12/2012

I doubt it. They lost a lot of money that day.

[82ndBaggy]

01:13 PM on 03/18/2012

Teen drug use is a problem that does need to be addressed. Constructive engagement has a better track record at reducing drug use and keeping the young from lifelong criminalization (which is very costly to society/taxpayers).

Such actions are loved by the private prison industry (fills those beds for years to come), but only exacerbate the problem. The black market only gets more profitable and plenty of others will take the place of those arrested.

[GeorgeSM]

01:12 PM on 03/18/2012

Wrecking the lives of teenagers with a criminal record is a verry short sighted way to deal with the drug problem in America. A quarter of the worlds prison population is in America, mostly because of drugs, and that is testimony enough that this is a failed and counter productive policy.

[MiddleRiver]

01:31 PM on 03/18/2012

Follow the money. For-profit prisons are a booming industry with long lobbying arms. The governors' "tough on drugs" personas are prompted by bribes...I mean campaign contributions, and sometimes partial ownership in for-profit prisons.

[Mark Knudsen]

01:51 PM on 03/18/2012

the drug problems can be brought under control but t will be a long term process.causer first we have to change our culture and that will take a couple of generations...we take drugs because we are hurting and can't cope we our daily lives..we need to heal that..and we are now a society who have very little in coping skills and few who do who can even teach it..we have been to busy living the good life wanting our "Rights" and not learning our "Responsibilities" and until we change that nothing changes..the old viking

[bragladish]

02:25 PM on 03/18/2012

Pot is not just for coping, it's also taken for fun, just for fun! Because it is fun! It switches your perspective and in turn is very philosophically and spiritually stimulating. And it is less dangerous than the millions of products being hawked on the free market, including everything from alcohol, fast food, sodas, processed foods, sugar, etc. There are more deaths, in one day, caused by processed foods than there has been in the entire history of pot smoking! And why can't someone who does not wish to suffer through a hangover, and the many other terrible things that go along with getting drunk, (alcohol actually destroys DNA) simply have a few puffs of a joint, relax and have a good time without destroying their bodies with booze?

So the market demands that if you want to have a good time than your only allowed to kill yourself and not allowed to do it any other way!?!? The problem with pot is that it changes people... and I don't mean makes them worse but wakes them up to the fact that reality is not what it seems, and that is not dangerous to people, that's only dangerous to the the crooks who have a hold on us.

[mdh461]

12:22 PM on 03/19/2012

I agree.

[TINKER6]

12:58 PM on 03/18/2012

Maybe the bust isn't the drugs.
Where no one seems/ or looks!