FED-UP TEEN TURNS IN DAD FOR GROWING MARIJUANA

SEATTLE - Fed up with living in a house that had become a marijuana
nursery, a Covington, Wash., teenager picked up the telephone and dialed
911 to turn in his own father Tuesday evening, sheriff's deputies said.

"The kid said he was sick and tired of being around drugs and sick and
tired of his dad doing drugs," King County sheriff's spokesman Greg
Dymerski said. "He's a good kid, and his conscience got the best of him."

The 38-year-old divorced father of three was booked into the King County
Jail on suspicion of drug felonies after deputies carted off at least 40
plants, bags of dried and ready-to-sell marijuana buds and scales to
measure the crop, Dymerski said. The 17-year-old, his 15-year-old sister
and their 7-year-old brother went to stay with family friends, deputies said.

The teen called 911 after 8 p.m. and told a dispatcher about the illicit
garden in a room in the garage of the house. As deputies approached the
house, they could smell the marijuana.

They cordoned off the house while they requested a search warrant. As they
waited, the father drove up around 9 p.m. and was arrested. According to
court records, he had been convicted of a drug felony in 1997 and was
sentenced to community service.

Sheriff's deputies said they don't actively encourage children to inform on
their parents for minor indiscretions but that in this case the father had
crossed the line. "The kid was being forced to sleep near where the drugs
were growing," Dymerski said. "We're talking about a 17-year-old being
subjected to obvious felony offenses."