National Roundup

Wisconsin
Police trying to solve Christmas tree ring mystery

GERMANTOWN, Wis. (AP) - A Wisconsin police department is trying to figure out who left a diamond ring on its Christmas tree.

Germantown Police Chief Peter Hoell posted a note on his department's Facebook page Saturday, asking if anyone knew where the ring came from.

He says the diamonds are real. Police think someone intentionally placed the ring on a branch of the tree in the police department's lobby.

For the past five weeks, the department invited people to bring their children to decorate the tree and get a stuffed animal in return. During that time, someone put the ring on the tree but left no explanation.

Germantown is about 15 miles northwest of Milwaukee.

The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reports that anyone claiming the ring will have to provide a detailed description.

Kentucky
15 charged with animal cruelty

ALBANY, Ky. (AP) - Kentucky State Police say 15 people found at a cockfight in southern Kentucky are facing charges.

A police statement says troopers received an anonymous tip about a possible cockfight on Sunday near Albany. The statement says a trooper and Clinton County Sheriff Rick Riddle responded and found a cockfight in progress.

They arrested 15 people, who are all charged with animal cruelty and trespassing.

Clinton County Animal Control took possession of 23 chickens.

Police say they are still investigating.

Ohio
Mayor didn't trust state to review shooting

CLEVELAND (AP) - Cleveland's mayor says he didn't trust a state agency to investigate the fatal police shooting of a 12-year-old boy who was carrying a pellet gun because he believes the agency mishandled a different shooting investigation that led to charges against officers.

The Northeast Ohio Media Group reports Mayor Frank Jackson explained Sunday how his thinking on the Tamir Rice case was influenced by the review of a November 2012 chase and shooting that ended with the deaths of two unarmed suspects.

Jackson says he asked the Cuyahoga (ky-uh-HOH'-guh) County sheriff to investigate Tamir's death because he wasn't confident a transparent investigation with due process would be conducted by the Bureau of Criminal Investigation and Ohio's attorney general.

Messages seeking comment were left early Monday for the attorney general's office.

Oregon
Naked man broke into homes, used hot tub, say cops

KEIZER, Ore. (AP) - Police near Salem, Oregon, say they arrested a naked man after he broke into two homes, drank booze and used a hot tub at one of them.

Officers received a 911 call early Sunday from a woman who was house-sitting in Keizer when she was awakened by noises coming from the laundry room.

As she went to check it out, the laundry room door slammed, so she grabbed a knife and called police and her husband.

Police found the burglar inside, naked, and arrested him without incident. Investigators determined that he climbed in through a back window after removing a screen.

They also noticed that screens had been removed from windows at a neighbor's home. Police say the suspect had burglarized that home, drinking the homeowner's alcohol and using the hot tub and shower.

California
Meth seizures at Mexico border soar in 2014

SAN DIEGO (AP) - Seizures of methamphetamine soared at the US-Mexico border during fiscal year 2014, accelerating a trend that began several years ago as new laws that limited access to the drug's chemical ingredients made it harder to manufacture it in the U.S.

Meth seized by the U.S. Customs and Border Protection's San Diego field office accounted for nearly two-thirds - 63 percent - of all the meth seized at all ports of entry nationwide in the fiscal year ending Sept. 30, the San Diego Union-Tribune newspaper reported Sunday.

Almost all of the meth consumed in the U.S. was once manufactured domestically, with San Diego as a known production hub.

But a crackdown in the U.S. on the precursor chemicals used to make the synthetic drug has pushed its manufacture south of the border, where drug cartels now find it cheaper and easier to produce and smuggle over the border than cocaine from South America, the paper reported.

With the California border as their main smuggling route, "the Mexican cartels are flooding the U.S. marketplace with their cheap methamphetamine," said Gary Hill, the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration's assistant special agent in charge in San Diego.

U.S. Customs and Border Protection figures show a 300 percent increase in meth seizures at California ports of entry from fiscal 2009 to 2014.

Agents find the drug, often in smaller quantities, strapped to pedestrians crossing the border, in gas tanks, mixed in with clothing or hidden in food cans emptied of their original contents. In some instances, smugglers are liquefying the drug and trying to conceal it as windshield washer fluid.

Undercover agents are buying the stuff in San Diego for about $3,500 a pound - about a third the cost of a pound of cocaine - and prices have been decreasing since 2008, Hill said. He added that, unlike with cocaine, drug cartels can eliminate the middleman by directly overseeing meth manufacturing and the smaller overhead means a cheaper street price in the U.S.

Joe Garcia, interim special agent in charge for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement Homeland Security Investigations in San Diego, said much of the meth coming into San Diego is headed north. Los Angeles has emerged as an important hub for shipments headed elsewhere, he said.

"Our investigations take us through all corners of the country," he said. "It's going into Canada as well."

Locally, authorities in San Diego have seen the consequences of more meth coming across the border.

Emergency room visits and deaths are up, as are the number of arrests for meth, said Angela Goldberg, coordinator for the Meth Strike Force, an effort by law enforcement and health officials in San Diego County to combat meth.

And drug prosecutions in San Diego County for meth jumped from eight in 2013 to 60 in 2014.

"It's very hard to get past these drug cartels," Goldberg said. "They're very good at what they do."

Published: Tue, Jan 06, 2015