Tonight's local evening news carried the story of a man whose car was stolen near Forest Park. Later, he received a call from police stating they'd found the car, and that he could pick it up. He eventually had to pay $200 in fees to get his car back: turns out they charged him sky-high rates for towing it from the location they found it, and two day's storage. Since it was found only two miles from his house, he was irritated at the charges.

But the story gets more interesting: Apparently, when he got it back, he found it full of stolen wallets, credit cards, ID cards, and crack pipes.

Need I say this speaks incredibly poorly of their interest in solving the crime. Shouldn't the car have been dusted for prints anyway, to see if they could find out who stole the car? Much less been very interested in the large number of thefts represented by the accumulation of all those IDs? (They showed a huge stack of them!)

A police spokesman responded by saying those items should have been removed from the car. Oh really? No, those items should have been examined closely and entered as evidence against the thief.

Perhaps $10,000+ theft from a private citizen doesn't "cut it" as being worth the attention. Nor lots of thefts of wallets and backpacks (it was taken near Washington University). But isn't that worth quite a bit more to the community than giving some guy a ticket for going 66 in a 55 mph zone?

I guess it's just more evidence of the low level of interest some police forces have in solving certain kinds of everyday, "bread 'n butter" crimes. Of course, what are they actually hired to do? I'm not saying they're doing a bad job, but if grand theft auto, identity theft, and crack cocaine use isn't the kind of thing that interests them, then what on earth are they focusing on?

Note: This is not meant as an aspersion against all the hard-working men in blue. I strongly suspect (hope?) my own local police department, Maryland Heights, would have been all over it. But SLPD doesn't exactly have a great reputation.