http://www.kvue.com/news/state/stories/092107kvuepotcop-bm.f824eed0.html
DALLAS COUNTY — When it comes to marijuana, Barry Cooper is on the wrong side of the law.
"The war on drugs is a failed policy; it's not working," Cooper says. "This isn't 1957 any longer, it's 2007—and the facts and the evidence show that marijuana should be legal."
Cooper not only believes marijuana should be legal, he's trying to help people grow it—and not get caught.
Barry Coooper now earns a living making DVDs like the one titled, "Never Get Busted Again." It promises to help viewer stay out of jail if they get stopped with marijuana in their car.
His next project—"How Not to Get Raided"—will show how to grow and sell marijuana.
"Marijuana is the number one cash crop in the U.S., going into the billions of dollars, right about corn," Cooper says. "Corn is second."
Cooper says the bumper crop of pot found this summer in Dallas only proves how popular pot has become.
"Americans are not going to stop growing it; they're not going to stop buying it; they're not going to stop smoking it—even if you continue to put them in jail," he said. "The proof of that is we now have more people in jail for marijuana than ever before, yet large bumper crops keep popping up."
Last month, a team of agents from the Dallas Police Department and the Drug Enforcement Administration cleared tens of thousands of marijuana plants from at least seven fields in the Dallas area, collecting carloads of pot worth millions of dollars to be destroyed at a DEA facility.
"It's impossible to eradicate, and I know that because I'm an ex-narcotics officer," Cooper said. "My commander ... said I was one of the best narcotics officers in the nation. I've got over 800 narcotics arrests personally credited, not counting thousands I worked as joint operations. I worked joint operations with DEA, FBI, ATF, US military ... just about every agency you can think of."
So what triggered Cooper's transformation from super cop to pot pitchman? "I was taught by the government that evil people smoke marijuana and evil people trafficked it and grew it," he said. "Of all the arrests I made, I can't think of one marijuana smoker who fought me ... We have 750,000 docile, non-violent people who go to prison for marijuana possession every year."
Not surprisingly, agents who are still busting drug dealers and confiscating tons of marijuana aren't impressed with Cooper's new line of work.
Dallas police and the DEA disagree with Cooper's claim that they are fighting a losing battle. They are so confident that they have found all the marijuana fields in Dallas that they are no longer doing aerial surveillance; the task force helicopters have all been sent back to Austin.
"There is no way DEA has eradicated all these plants, I'm confident of that," Cooper said.
To see if he was correct, HD Chopper 8 flew Cooper over one of the largest fields that was found by the DEA near Grand Prairie to see if he could spot any marijuana from the air. He identified some plants, from the air; getting there by foot was a bit trickier.
"The copter just dropped us in the location where the marijuana fields are, and we've noticed right here, the cut fence where the growers are getting in and out and it's right next to water, less than 20 yards away," Cooper said.
Our expedition found one of the watering cans used by the growers, along with plenty of evidence about how they operate.
"Notice these Dixie Cups everywhere? They use these to start the seedlings; then they transplant them," Cooper explained.
He said most of the bigger fields like this are farmed by drug traffickers from across the border. "The Mexicans have figured out it's easier to just grow it in the U.S. and distribute it," Cooper said. "Since 9/11, they found the U.S. tightening the border, so they've learned it's just as easy to come here and plant."
The growers plant the marijuana deep in heavily wooded areas to make the plants difficult to find. "I'm looking for any booby traps or anything like that, anything out of the ordinary," Cooper said as he scoured the field for evidence. "I'm looking for anything man-made."
In one of the fields that was cleared by drug agents last month, you can see the holes where rows of marijuana plants were pulled up. But it didn't take long before Cooper found what he was looking for.
"What did I tell you? I was confident they couldn't get all of it," he said. "Here's another big pot plant ... that's five marijuana plants in 30 seconds."
Cooper identified 10 plants in one location, then more and more.
"There's no doubt in my mind there are thousands of other fields like these," he said. "I think they got seven; there are thousands more. They are about to start budding. October is harvest time."
Barry Cooper and the DEA do agree on one thing: Both told us they believe many of the pot plantations popping up in Texas are operated by drug traffickers from Mexico who decided it's easier to grow it here than to smuggle it across the border.
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