5

If You Don't Want To Look Like A Drug Dealer, Buy Lots Of Furniture

At this point, I thought they had mistaken me for someone else. I asked what was going on, but he just kept pointing his gun at me and yelling "Get out of the car, put your hands up, get out of the car" until I complied. Slowly, I got out of my car, then a third cop threw me against it, cuffed my hands behind my back, and searched my pockets, taking my wallet and phone. As I was thrown in the back of the squad car, I started to wonder if perhaps this wasn't a very elaborately disguised robbery.

bmcent1/iStock

Then a detective started asking me questions, insisting that I "knew what was going on" despite the fact that I so clearly didn't. He told me they were raiding the house, and asked me if there were any guns in the house, if I knew how many people were in the house, and if I knew about my downstairs neighbors' drug operation. When my answers to these questions proved unsatisfactory, the detective told me that they were looking for the neighbor, and that they believed my girlfriend and I might be working with them.

There were a few reasons for this: First, there's that whole "legally only one rental" thing. Thus, the police had no idea that there were two separate apartments in the house. Second, the basement apartment was furnished, while the upper unit was not. We had only been living upstairs for three weeks or so, had been too cheap to buy much furniture. Other than a bed, a few chairs, and a dining room table, we didn't have much. Turns out there's another kind of person who doesn't have much: drug dealers.

urbancow/iStock

4

There Was A Fair Amount of Nudity

So there I was, sitting in the back of a police car, watching from across the street as the police charged into my house. I listened over the radio as the police directed teams to all converge on the house at the same time. About ten black SUVs surged in, and about 30 cops in full raid gear charged at my apartment. They even used one of those battering rams to bust in the side door. It was almost awesome, like an action movie ... happening to your home and family.

U.S. Air Force/Sr. Airman Whitney Lambert

Inside was my sleeping girlfriend, as well as our pit bull. Our dog happens to be friendlier than a thousand Mr. Peanutbutters, but historically, cops and pit bulls don't get along, and I was afraid she would end up shot. I had begged the police to let me come in with them so my dog wouldn't be scared, but of course, they didn't allow that.

I wasn't able to see the next part from the police car, but my girlfriend said that the police stormed in screaming at her to get on the floor, to take care of the dog, and other orders that couldn't possibly be followed simultaneously. An officer later told us this was intentional, to create a sense of confusion, because "we have a plan, and we don't want you to come up with a plan." My girlfriend shoved our dog back into the bedroom and then was forced to lie naked on the floor (did I mention she had been sleeping naked?) while the police cleared the rest of the apartment.

imagedepotpro/iStock

3

The Police Made Idle Chit-Chat With Us As They Destroyed Our Belongings

After the police had cleared the house, they led me, still handcuffed, into my apartment. Sitting in my living room was my girlfriend, as well as the girl who lived downstairs. At this point, we learned two things about her boyfriend, whom we'll call Druggie McDealerson:

1) It was actually him that the police were looking for, and...

2) He wasn't home.

While waiting for him to turn up, the three of us sat in the most uniquely awkward silence you can imagine. Dozens of cops walked up and down the stairs, in and out of our apartment, pulling clothes out of closets, dishes off of shelves, things out of boxes, leaving it all in messy piles around our apartment.

KatarzynaBialasiewicz/iStock

One police officer stood watch over us, making the most inappropriate small talk this side of anything-at-a-urinal:

"Oh, that's a nice guitar you have, I play too."

*They destroy the guitar, looking for drugs*

"I see you have a sewing machine, how handy."

*They destroy the sewing machine, looking for drugs*

But if we asked this cop anything about what was going on -- what they were looking for, what happens next, just ... what, please, what? -- she immediately shut down.

zoka74/iStock

2

The Cops Will Threaten You Even If -- ESPECIALLY IF -- You Don't Know Anything

I sat alone in my spare bedroom with two detectives. They asked all sorts of questions, starting with seemingly innocent ones, like where I work, how long I'd lived here, how long I knew the downstairs neighbors, etc. The niceties out of the way, they asked if I had ever bought anything from the couple downstairs, if I had ever accepted any items from them, if the neighbors had ever given me money. After responding, respectively and truthfully, "Nope, never, if they did I would have more furniture," the questions started becoming confusing.

avid_creative/iStock

1

The Ordeal Doesn't End When The Raid Does

After tearing apart our home and interrogating us, the police seemed to finally believe that my girlfriend and I were not connected to our neighbors' operation. They arrested our neighbors, but my girlfriend and I were not charged. We couldn't put the ordeal behind us quite yet: For one thing, cops don't clean up their mess, even if they find out you're innocent. Our house was trashed.

One of the first things we did was call our landlord. Even though the police had found us innocent, our landlord was pissed, and insisted that we were to blame for her house being torn apart and one of her tenants getting arrested. Because of our ... machinations? I never did follow the logic. We decided that we were moving out immediately, so she threatened to charge us with an eviction if we didn't pay her two months' rent for the privilege. We moved out a few days later. We didn't pay the extra rent, but she did keep our deposit. Fair's fair, I suppose.

U.S. Air Force/Sr. Airman Whitney Lambert

But even after moving to a different city, we still weren't done. Nearly six months later, my girlfriend got a phone call from the county's public defender office, saying she'd been subpoenaed to testify in our neighbor's trial. For the defense. She was expected to testify in support of the person that dragged us into this mess. For months, she had anxiety dreams, thinking about having to relive the event in court, in front of the police that tore our house apart, saw her naked, and terrorized us. Fortunately, the day before the trial, our old neighbor ended up taking a plea deal, but the subpoena still caused a huge amount of stress in our lives when all we wanted was to forget any of this happened.

Wavebreakmedia/iStock

It's been about a year since the raid, and the trial ended a few months ago, but I am still affected by the ordeal. Whenever a police car pulls up behind me, or I see an officer on the street, I immediately panic, even though I'm not breaking any laws. I'm too terrified to even speed now, because the thought of interacting with a police officer terrifies me, which I guess is probably a net positive for everyone involved? A lawyer told me that I'd probably have grounds to sue the police, but I'd rather just put the event behind me. I don't want money, and I especially don't want to endure a long, drawn-out trial -- I just want to roll an occasional stop sign in peace. It's a meager dream, but it is mine.

Kevin and his girlfriend now run their own graphic and web-design business. You can find it at http://www.asmarterimpact.com/. Kevin also has a Twitter where he says things sometimes.

Join Jack O'Brien and Cracked staffers Carmen Angelica, Alex Schmidt, Michael Swaim, plus comedian Blake Wexler for a retelling of history's biggest moments you didn't realize everyone was drunk for. Get your tickets here.

Also check out 5 Things Breaking Bad Left Out About Having A Drug Lord Dad and 6 Drug Busts That Went Embarrassingly Wrong.

Have a story to share with Cracked? Email us here.

Subscribe to our YouTube channel, and check out Why Movie Cops Are Terrible At Their Jobs, and other videos you won't see on the site!

Follow us on Facebook, and we'll follow you everywhere.