POLICE SAY 'RENT-A-ROCK' CASES WASTE TIME, RESOURCES FOR TRUE VICTIMS

Usually at least one case file that describes a carjacking lies amid the
stacks of yellow folders piled on the desks of each of the four Shreveport
police armed robbery detectives.

But more often than not, it turns out to be a drain on resources, loss of
man hours and a disservice to true victims, detectives say. That's because
the carjacking is really what they call a rent-a-rock case.

"The majority of the time the offense is not as it has been reported," said
Sgt. Kevin Crow, supervisor of the Tactical Robbery Unit. "The victim will
go and either be involved in illegal acts such as purchasing narcotics and
get robbed of their vehicle, or they'll rent their vehicle out for
narcotics. When the suspects don't return the vehicle at the appointed
location and time, (the victim) has to say something. That's when they make
up the stories about what they were doing and where they were when they
were robbed."

It's frustrating to detectives and patrol officers alike who spend
countless hours searching for suspects and tracking down information only
to find out the entire claim was a lie.

"They rent their car and when the people don't return it, they want their
car back and they need help doing it," Crow said. "But they can't tell the
police 'I loaned it out for dope and they won't give it back.' That doesn't
go over well with the police."

Meanwhile, detectives must put valuable time into investigating the crime
just as they would any other, Crow said.

"Then you've spent all that time and you don't have a credible case because
your only witness started the whole thing off with a lie and now it's
nonprosecutable," he said. "Even if you could find the suspects, your
victim's credibility and reliability is shot."

Wasted time and effort

Sometimes the investigations into such bogus cases can take months while
detectives work to find the stolen vehicle and then backtrack through the
people who have been in possession of it. But even if detectives are able
to determine the truth in a day, it's still a loss, Crow said.

"The only people it's really hurting (are) legitimate victims of legitimate
crimes because you're spreading the limited resources and limited manpower
you have on crimes that didn't happen," he said. "When you do that, you're
taking those resources away from legitimate victims."

Detective Mike McConnell recently spent his entire eight-hour shift trying
to get to the bottom of such a case.

A woman told police two men forcibly took her car from her as she stepped
out of it downtown on Texas Street. Patrol officers were able to find her
car and two suspects close by a short time later. But it took the rest of
the day to find the truth, McConnell said.

"You have to listen to both the suspects' and the victims' stories and
figure out the truth because in these cases, both are telling lies," he said.

The suspects in this case told McConnell they met the woman at some
apartments in the 900 block of Sprague Street.

"She told them she'd just been sold fake crack cocaine and they offered to
get her money back if she let them use her car," McConnell said. "They said
she agreed and I knew right then it was a rent-a-rock deal."

When McConnell pressed the woman for the truth, she finally admitted she
was sold fake crack cocaine and the two suspects approached her with powder
cocaine.

"One of them asked for her key to take a snort and that's when they jumped
in her car and took it," he said.

A crime without punishment

The number of these cases vary from month to month, with as few as two or
as many as 12, Crow said.

"If you look at the areas of the city that historically have the highest
narcotic-related crime, that's where you're going to find the majority of
these carjackings," he said. "We've had victims in the past who have
reported their car being jacked three or four times in the same year."

And in most of those cases, police can put no one in jail, Crow said.

"Even if you get the suspect, he's going to say 'he let me use the car.'
Usually the victims are not going to want to pursue charges because they'll
have it come out in court they were buying dope and they just wanted to get
their car back," Crow said. "The most we can do is charge the victim with a
misdemeanor charge of filing a false police report, but that doesn't recoup
the time and effort lost."

Aside from the wasted time and effort, not being able to hold anyone
responsible is the most frustrating to police, Crow said.

"You take a rent-a-rock case and you know you don't really have to bring it
back because odds are no one's going to press charges," Crow said. "There's
no repercussions for the bad guys who take the cars."

But it doesn't have to be that way. Just telling the truth can change
everything, McConnell said.

"Just because an individual is engaged in criminal activity doesn't mean
someone else has the right to rob him," he said citing a case where a man
admitted to police that he was robbed by a prostitute he had solicited.
"Just as long as I know the truth and the prosecutor knows the truth, we
can proceed. All they've got to do is tell the truth. That doesn't happen
often but it's great when it does happen because that way you're not just
wasting your time."