DRIVING OUT DRUG DEALERS

Edmonton police Det. Maurice Brodeur lets out a long sigh, followed
by a low chuckle.

"We're so busy," he says. "The public's response has been amazing.
It's exhausting, but exhilarating."

Like Dr. Frankenstein, Brodeur has created a monster of sorts. But
unlike Mary Shelley's iconic creature, the good folks of Edmonton
have embraced Dr. Brodeur's beast, which has been unleashed on drug
dealers across the city.

Since Brodeur's Report A Drug House program was formally launched in
June, it's received tips on a staggering 250 suspected drug dens.

"So far, we've looked into 125 of them," he says. "We're getting to
the rest as quickly as we can."

He's asking the public for a little patience while everyone involved
in the program - cops and civilian volunteers - find their feet,
especially in light of the avalanche of reports they've received.

Brodeur hasn't even been able to come up for air long enough to put
together any stats. He can't say for certain how many of the 125 tips
they've checked out have turned out to be bona fide, or how many drug
houses have been shut down.

While Brodeur was a constable on the south side, he became an expert
in harassing dealers out of neighbourhoods.

His methods are outside standard police practices, but there's no
denying their staggering effectiveness. In one nine-month period, he
single-handedly shut down an average of 12 crack shacks a month.

Police brass were watching Brodeur, and they clearly liked what they
saw. In May, he trained fellow cops from the city and around northern
Alberta in his techniques and the program was formally launched last month.

There are now cops in every division working in the program and an
army of volunteers responding to phone calls and entering data into
the police computer system.

Brodeur doesn't worry himself with arrest statistics. His goal, he
explains, is to claim back neighbourhoods for average, law-abiding
citizens. If charges are laid, fantastic, but what matters is that
drug dealers' lives are made so unbearable that they pack up and get
out of Dodge.

He uses whatever legal means necessary, working with landlords,
health and fire inspectors and even animal control officials -
anything to disrupt a drug dealer's ability to do business.

Brodeur has asked other cops to park their cruisers outside drug
houses and do their paperwork.

PITBULL REPUTATION

He makes sure that people in drug houses get fined for barking dogs,
noisy parties and snow on their sidewalks.

His pitbull reputation grew so big on the south side that in some
cases all he had to do was leave his business card in a drug house's
door jamb and within a few days the dealer moved out.

Ironically, while some see his methods as revolutionary, Brodeur
calls it "old-school policing."

It's about getting to know neighbourhoods and working with citizens
to solve their problems.

The key, he says, is keeping citizens up to speed on what's going on.

"They have to hear back from us," he says. "They have to know what
we're doing to help them get their neighbourhood back."

As Brodeur told the cops he was training, the drug trade is the
gasoline that fuels crime.

When a drug dealer sets up shop in a neighbourhood, there is always a
massive spike in thefts and burglaries in the surrounding homes by
addicts desperately trying to feed their habits.

You can report a suspected drug house by calling 426-8229 or by going
to the tips page on the Edmonton Police Service website
(www.police.edmonton.ab.ca).