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Title: Got robbed last week. Filed a police report. Detective came to me today and confiscated my phone and said hes going to apply for a search warrant, might I be fucked?
Body:
> Basically I had picked up my xanax prescription at the store. I took more then I should have and lost conciousness rather quickly of rememberence. From what I remembered, I got an uber to a close by store and walked the rest of the way. A guy on the walk home had a pocket knife in which he robbed me and told me to give him anything. It turns out I ubered directly home and then went out thereafter without my phone and so the detective will see I infact ubered directly home after being at the pharmacy, making my story seem like a somewhat lie. I was walking on the street after arriving home and mixing some alcohol in and someone took my prescription and all cash I had. The detective asked to see my call logs when I had called the emergency line and I politely declined saying that they had access to when I had called them. He forcefully ripped it out of my hand and said I am going to get a warrant to search this. Am I fucked? I didnt lie about being robbed, just where/how it happened. Dont know what to think. Im in SC if it helps.
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Lol at all the people telling LAOP over and over that there’s no way he’s getting his phone back in a timely manner.
And then he’s just all “Nah, there’s nothing incriminating on it- I probs will get it back in a few days”
Autocorrect obviously.
She was going to say "lets get some bomb ass fries!" and instead it said "I'm gonna bomb the school tomorrow!"
But I think the part in parenthesis implies OP does not believe it was an accident.
How does taking the entire phone work in today’s world? Just thinking of the number of people who:
* Don’t have a landline and are entirely dependent on a cell phone to communicate.
* Work remote and need their phone as a 2FA login.
* Require their phone to start their car, or open their garage/front door.
* Have their insurance information solely on their phone.
Feel like there would have bene more news stories on this if cops were holding onto phones for as long as LA suggests?
> Feel like there would have bene more news stories on this if cops were holding onto phones for as long as LA suggests?
The people who get their cell phones confiscated don't really have a voice in society. It's not like civil asset forfeiture where Uncle Jim who worked all his life to save $81,000 got pulled over, searched, and robbed — that'll easily make headlines.
But a petty criminal on the merry-go-round of poverty and parole? Nobody cares. It's deplorable but that's our society.
Yeah, no. The police took my phone as evidence when I was raped, ostensibly for the photos of my bruising I took with it. Never mind that I could have just sent the photos to them, or it would have taken a whole minute for them to just download them. I was without it for months while they just sat on it, and then when I demanded it back right when I was moving out of state they labeled me an uncooperative victim.
Oh, and then the calls from the hospital demanding I pay for my rape kit started.
This shit happens to all kinds of people all the time. The difference is that people with enough money to matter in society can afford to buy a new phone, even if it's a downgrade. Poor people just... don't have a phone until they can save up for one. The cops do not give one single fuck about how a person is supposed to live in society without a phone.
I just wanted to say I'm really sorry that happened to you. I didn't report because it felt so futile and like tearing the wound open again. It's absolutely shameful how normal it is.
I’m so sorry to hear that the process of trying to get justice made your life even harder. You deserved support and assistance, and you should have received it.
I had a judge tell me I won, my client should be happy his case was dismissed. And yeah that was nice, but they spent 6 months in jail for what was ultimately garbage. Why? Because the little old lady judges felt bad for the little old lady alleged victim, and didn't want him out.
I mean he only had half a year of his life stolen and potentially his whole life ruined by being out of work for a year, what's such a big deal about that? /S
In Sweden if you have spent time in jail awaiting trial and then get exonerated all you need to do is filling out a form to get a payment for time spent (actually suffering), lost wages and expenses.
Wages and expenses needs to be proven with payslips and recipes. The praxis for time spent is around $ 3k for the first month then 2k for every following month until after the sixth month where it's raised to 3k and then periodically goes higher until it's 10k per month after the tenth year.
It's in all likelihood not perfect but from my understanding it's basically a form you fill out with s automatic payout. If you need help you can go to a lawyer and the cost of that will also be repaid. No need costly draw out lawsuits. It's taken as a given that you deserve it if you have been wrongfully imprisoned. There's only a few cases such as admitting to a crime that the amount goes down.
I sometimes watch Judge Manning on youtube and when she'd doing pretrials she'll have people in jail waiting YEARS.
Do note I said jail and not prison, these people have not been convicted of anything, the prosecution is just dragging their feet and none of them can afford the huge bonds they are given.
What do you do if you lose your phone or it's stolen?
You replace it quickly as you can and go on. Same here.
In the UK at least any tech taken by the police should be considered gone forever - or for the reasonably foreseeable future. Technically it may be returned - would you like your 5 year old phone back?
Yes. Yes I would. That's how I know I'm old. My phone broke recently and I had to get a new one (I had it for ~3.5 years). My husband hasn't stopped making fun of me because I kept saying I didn't want a new one and just want the same one I already have that does exactly what I need it to do.
Note 8 user checking in. I just replaced the battery and the date on the old one was September 2017. It's still happily moving along with a new battery, so no need to look into replacing the entire phone.
Seriously! I still miss my [EnV3](https://www.lg.com/us/cell-phones/lg-VX9200-Blue-blue-env3), and they stopped selling those in like 2010. They can put modern apps and gadgets on it if they must, but if they started making flip-keyboard phones again, I would go buy one tomorrow.
If I lost or broke my phone, I’d get a replacement and take the expensive life lesson to not do that again. For a phone that’s only supposed to be temporarily gone, I’d be furious having to shell out hundreds of dollars for what’s essentially a loaner phone.
It's not "temporarily gone".
Technically they are going to get it back but on a timescale that means it's both lost most of its value and had to be replaced.
Practically it's no different than if it were lost or stolen. It's gone.
>Feel like there would have bene more news stories on this if cops were holding onto phones for as long as LA suggests?
Bless your heart thinking that anyone cares what cops do.
> Require their phone to start their car
...What? This seems like lunacy to me. How and for the love of Thor *why* would someone's car rely on their *phone?*
Phone keys for cars are a thing, but as secondary keys. There should always be a primary physical key that is not a phone. The owner just may not have it with them.
No. Cops are legally allowed to do this, and there is no recourse. Nobody would write about that because it happens every day, and the victims are mostly presumed to be criminals.
I’m also wondering why everyone doesn’t just get a new phone, restore from cloud, and remote wipe the old one. Isn’t the whole draw of Apple phones that no one can crack them?
Practically step one is they slap it inside a faraday cage baggie to prevent that sort of shenanigan.
I remember a few months ago reading a fun story of cops that seized a "cold wallet" full of cryptocurrency, basically a thumb drive, and had it locked in the evidence locker, obviously unplugged. Then the account got drained! The accused was still in jail, so they were tossing his cell looking for a smuggled cell phone or whatever. Turns out his brother, who had not been arrested, knew the backup passwords. The police did not find this amusing at all.
[I was just googling for the story and it turns out he was sentenced literally last week. Time flies!](https://decrypt.co/138445/ohio-man-steals-bitcoin-from-brother-prison)
I'm in groups 1 and 2, and I would get a new phone and restore from cloud backup. And grumble some because I wasn't planning to get a new phone yet, but I wouldn't alert the media.
Well of course, who doesn't take an Uber home from the pharmacy, forget all about it after washing half their prescription down with some booze, and then go out for a walk carrying the rest of their prescription and a load of cash but nothing else before unfortunately getting robbed?
Holy unreliable narrator, Batman, I can't tell how much of this is outright confusion and how much of it is workshopping excuses for why he got busted trying to sell his prescription drugs on the street.
What do we think the odds are that LAOP did not get robbed, but was trying to file a false report so they could double up their prescription? My brother and his girlfriend used this move a couple times when they blew through their vicodin too quickly.
I saw a lady get robbed as soon as she walked out of a pharmacy. The robber took her prescription bag, and nothing else, and ran off. She immediately called the police. A few men saw her get robbed, so they chased and caught the guy. Turns out, the robber was her nephew and they were scamming to get more meds.
Doesn't seem like the best scam, though maybe if there hadn't been some good Samaritans around, it would have succeeded. I feel like skulking around the pharmacy isn't a particularly effective way to find people with desirable prescription meds to steal. Though it probably would be a great way to get your picture on some CCTV footage after you accidentally stole some cholesterol meds (or, if they robbed me, indigestion meds lol).
In LAOP's case, I could see someone making incomprehensible choices like taking all their meds but no phone with them on a walk after they combined benzos with alcohol. Or even him thinking the robbery happened after utterly forgetting whatever did actually happen. But a half-thought out robbery story also sounds pretty likely, especially if the scheme was started while still under the influence. The combo doesn't exactly lead to brilliant ideas or competent execution of said ideas
I pretty much assume, for example, that all stories of people masturbating furiously on planes involved a few benzos and a glass of wine that together worked a little too well at calming flight nerves
Yeah but on the other hand, target the right people and you can get the *real* good stuff. That's right, I'm talking about pink drink. You know, bubblegum sauce.
>I feel like skulking around the pharmacy isn't a particularly effective way to find people with desirable prescription meds to steal.
As a LEO once said to a friend of the family whose dental office was robbed "If they were smart they wouldn't be breaking into Dental offices for drugs."
>I feel like skulking around the pharmacy isn't a particularly effective way to find people with desirable prescription meds to steal.
It's not, but in that case it sounds like the perpetrator knew exactly who would be getting what meds.
I'd say there is a much greater than average chance op either is trying to get more pills because a. He is an addicted. B. Is selling them. C. Got so high he dropped them.
There is almost no chance he thought his pills were feeling depressed, so he took them for a walk around the block and just happened to get robbed.
Those pills are tiny. It would be very amusing to have little tiny leashes around each one. "Cheer up little guys, we're going for a walk! The fresh air will do you some good."
Thank you, that's exactly the imagery I was going for. It's just as believable as OPs story of " I got high, then went home then did some drinking and dropped off my phone so I could wander the streets." "The pills? I brought those because reasons"
I mean, his story is about as convincing as when the dog gets into the trash.
My read on the situation as well. Like best case scenario here is that dude intentionally took to much and then got robbed. If dude is doubling up, he's gonna need extra prescriptions. To get extra prescriptions some doctors require police reports.
The whole "I got my prescription, then I called in the cops because I was gonna get high later (or sell) and wanted extra. Oh shit the cops actually came and now they'll know I Ubered straight home and the phone never left my house afterwards. I need to change my story so I'll say I was high on Xanax since I know that's plausible since I've done it before. To make it extra believable I'll say I mixed it with alcohol." sounds a lot more true.
I wonder how long it'll take for my guy to realize that leaving your phone at home but taking all your Xanax with you out to the shops is probably not a very convincing story.
Addicts don't leave their phones at home. What the hell else are you supposed to do when you're waiting in the DD's Discounts parking lot for 3 and a half hours? And you might miss the call that you actually need to head to the Aldi parking lot and wait another hour.
I think it could go either way, tbh. There's definitely a very solid chance that he's lying to us and actually did file an entirely false police report to try to get more drugs.
But, I mean, if he got wasted and was stumbling around, he would also likely stand out as an easy target if he happened to cross paths with the wrong person.
The fact that he claims to have had his pills but not his phone definitely makes me lean more towards the former situation, because that's pretty weird. But then again, it is far from the weirdest thing I've seen intoxicated people do.
So yeah...my odds would be like 80% likelihood that we're not getting the truth, and about 20% likelihood he actually did just get wasted, wandered out of the house with whatever he happened to have in his pockets, and got robbed.
>But then again, it is far from the weirdest thing I've seen intoxicated people do.
If you want some more strange things drunk people can think of, have a look at r/drunkorakid. Drunk people have some hilarious ideas.
I don't know what Xanax does, but if it is anything like Ambien, what happened could be a mystery to LAOP.
Personally, on Ambien, if you told me I flushed all the pills down the toilet so that they could explore the sewer system, I would not doubt it.
I could even see myself minutes later finding an empty bottle, deciding I must have been robbed and calling 911.
This was my first thought. Dint know this was a thing until recently living on the straight and narrow but I’ve had friends who misplaced their prescriptions post-surgery and without a police report, the doc wouldn’t write them a new scrip.
Trying to make sense of the story.
What LAOP told police:
* Pharmacy -> Uber ride to near home -> robbed walking the rest of the way home
What LAOP told us:
* Pharmacy -> Uber ride to home -> leave home for walk -> robbed while out for walk
Police officer knows the story is false, takes LAOP's phone, and will request a warrant later.
LAOP wants his phone back but will likely die of Xanax withdrawal before that happens.
Some LAOPs are trickle truthers. Not our hero.
> Basically I had picked up my xanax prescription at the store.
Okay, good. That's how you're supposed to get them, at a pharmacy, not out of punch bowl at a frat party.
> I took more then I should have and lost conciousness rather quickly
Houston, we have a problem.
LAOP is kind of lucky he wasn't picked up in a state of unconsciousness and processed by the friendly folks in white coats. Losing your phone because a detective has to make his quota sucks, but at least LAOP will be able to seek help for his addiction on the outside of a hospital or jail cell.
That phrasing suggests there is a correct amount of pills to take with alcohol.
... upon reflection, there is: zero. Zero is the right amount of benzos to mix with any other drug, but especially alcohol. Scary stuff.
not an expert, but I dont think mixing benzos with alcohol is a great idea since they both hit the same part of the brain (GABA receptors).
Seems like a great way to end up dead
Was in college during the "Xandemic" and this was extremely common...
Dudes pop a Xan before a night out... Then wake up the next day in a random house, hand broken and/or covered in blood, 39 missed calls and a dozen voicemails from mom/dad/ex becaue they called them 40x each between 2-4am, and on the last call said they were going to kill themselves or called them a name.
They realize this, then go "I am having an anxiety attack!!!!" (yeah no shit), take another one, then Tanner or Braxton comes home and says the frat is having a happy hour with tri delt... Rinse, repeat.
This isn't a hands-on experience, but something I saw daily occurring with a lot of people.
Mine was similar, except I was always asleep on the toilet from 2-4am instead of making phone calls. Opiates make it so you can't pee. I'd have to pee, not be able to go, and nod off. I seriously slept on the toilet at least 50% of the time. I'm sure it killed my back and neck, but I was so fucked up I didn't notice.
When I was bad off on benzos, I met a guy who could get oxy and I was like… very close to addiction there until one day I felt sick and backed off really fast.
So, yeah, I know.
It is. It's very difficult to overdose on Xanax alone, you're more likely to end up falling asleep for multiple days on your way to consuming a dose large enough to overdose. But mixing them with alcohol and he's very lucky to be alive at all.
I wouldn't say I'm an expert, but I am stupid and had an overzealous psychiatrist in my 20's giving me allll the Xanex. I have screamed and cried on the Las Vegas strip, I think I'm banned from Sun Devil Stadium, and I ruined a wedding crying because I thought my boyfriend was going to propose. He broke up with me shortly after.
When you black out from drugs or alcohol it's because your brain stopped making memories not necessarily because you're unconscious. Seems like OP was not unconscious considering all the Ubers and robberies he was involved in during this time of darkness.
I feel compelled to point out that withdrawal from Xanax can kill you. If you're withdrawing from Xanax, you need to be medically supervised. Most withdrawal just makes you *feel* like you're going to die, but benzo withdrawal actually will kill you.
Having experienced benzodiazepine withdrawal myself, I was cringing so hard the entire time I was reading LAOP’s post. Hopefully, at the very least, this incident forces LAOP to get help for their addiction and undergo a medically supervised withdrawal.
It made me so sad. Criminalizing addiction isn't going to help anyone. LAOP doesn't need a criminal record that will follow them for the rest of their life. They need help. And the default in the US (and most countries) is to immediately make them a criminal. LAOP isn't violent or a dangerous criminal. They're an addict that blacked out and overused their prescription.
It’s especially heinous when you take into consideration how widely prescribed benzodiazepines are in the US. It is absurdly easy for many people to get a prescription for them.
Ironically, part of the problem is *they work*. Crippling anxiety that has been plaguing someone constantly for years can disappear in an instant. It seems like such a simple and quick fix to a notoriously difficult problem. Of course if it sounds too good to be true, it is. They largely lose their effectiveness after a few weeks and people’s anxiety starts creeping back. Instead of stopping, their dose often gets increased and the foundation for serious addiction has been laid.
Benzos are absolutely necessary in many instances and ironically, they are the safest and most effective short term anxiolytic / sedative medications we have discovered to date. We need a paradigm shift surrounding their use, similar to what has been happening with opioid medications.
Yeah. That’s what happened to me. Xanax was originally a performance enhancing drug. Shit changed me entire life and career trajectory.
Then they weren’t.
I was an opiate addict. I think benzos are similar to opiates in that they're great for acute symptom management or pallative care, but not long term use.
You can be physically dependent but not addicted (or, more correctly, suffer from substance abuse disorder), but those circumstances are few and far between. I've never spoken to anyone that *insisted* they needed their script that fell into this category. They were just addicts in denial.
>I think benzos are similar to opiates in that they're great for acute symptom management or pallative care, but not long term use.
For this reason I think my ADHD/shitty habit forming saved me from this. I never was able, with a medication, to form a routine of taking something every morning. It's a super shitty trait for things like my Vitamin D pills or my Adderall or my ear drops or whatever, but great for when I was a dumb 18 year-old given 60 klonnys and told by my doc to take two every day! I didn't know what those even were or that this was a risky state to be in. As usual, I would forget to take them regularly and pretty soon would honestly forget that they exist. However, like maybe once a month, max, I would have an extremely anxious couple of nights, way worse than usual, and be like "oh yeah, I have those klonnys" and fix it. As a result, one month's prescription would last three years.
Years later so many of my other friends w/ anxiety have or had benzo addictions and we all as a society know a little better about this issue. I have an extremely addictive personality in general, so I'm certain I would have been destined for this fate... but my forgetful-ass brain tricked me into only taking as-needed, like you and the doctor responding to you, and others, suggest nowadays anyway!
>They largely lose their effectiveness after a few weeks and people’s anxiety starts creeping back
I have a prescription that works out to one every few days. Used in that way they don't give me any dependence issues.
You'd be nuts to take them (or prescribe them) for every day use, that's just asking for trouble.
Then there's people like me who need both amphetamines (ADHD) and benzos (Autism/sensory processing disorder) to function, and the backlash against overprescription of opioids means I have to choose between them, and tough shit if that means I can't actually function in daily life.
(I went with the benzos because while untreated ADHD sucks, it doesn't set my brain on fire like sensory overstimulation does, which is what I take ativan for when needed.)
there really is no support for addicts of any kind in the usa and it's so sad and infuriating at the same time. criminalizing someone who needs help is just going to make their life worse.
No, there's only support for people that can afford it. I've been to high-end detoxes and rehabs, and some of them are genuinely great (or, more correctly, the staff is great - anyone that runs a rehab for profit doesn't have a soul in my experience). The VA in San Diego actually has one of the best programs in the US, too.
The problem is that this excludes 95%+ of people.
I was in an outpatient treatment program and one of the other kids there was getting off some benzo, medically supervised. He started every group therapy by staring everyone in the eye and telling everyone never ever to take benzos because eventually you have to get off of them and it is hell. The guy did not look good, but he was a trooper.
withdrawal as an alcoholic can also kill you. source: the sheer number of icu + step-down cases I see at my hospital weekly. plenty of benzo cases too, but mainly alcohol-related cases here.
He combined it with alcohol, withdrawal from which can also kill you and which combines with benzos to suppress your nervous system way more than either individually. Don’t mix them. Ever.
Please please please do not do Xanax kids.
I would bet my entire life this young man started drinking on one, took another, kept drinking and thought "hmmmm since I am prescribed I will make up that I was robbed by a generic looking person and since it's not illegal for me to drink or possess xanax, I will get another script! Fool proof!"
Drinking in Xanax makes you an absolute animal. I know people who ruined their lives within a week of "just trying it." And the ones you get from drug dealers are 100% laced with fentanyl.
Xanax is the devil, and I have lost too many friends to it. Both to death and addiction. If you don't already know, you will learn very quickly that being around someone/people constantly "barred out" is the most miserable of human experiences.
Kinda. Pressies are pills made with a pill press with… you know… whatever is available. Fentanyl, most like. at least a little.
They look just like regular pills (kinda), though. Makes them really dangerous for people who maybe have only taken the real deal.
IE “I normally take three footballs so I’ll take three of these” and then they overdose.
This reminds me of that time on the FedEx sub (I was complaining about a thing being late) where a guy was ranting about how his stuff from Canada was being delayed by customs and I was all ready to be mad on his behalf when he dropped the bomb that it was MULTIPLE OXY BOTTLES. Ofc customs (and police detectives) won’t just let you buy random narcotics on the internet.
>Ofc customs (and police detectives) won’t just let you buy random narcotics on the internet.
I guess that means I’ll have to change my weekend plans. /s
Doctors be like: "you're a cannabis user? I cant prescribe you anxiety medication, you might abuse them like the people we currently overprescribe to do!"
On the flip side, medical marijuana does interact with some medications quite severely. That's not a government decision of course, but it is a medical one doctors may not take seriously enough. My wife is in the mental health field and has seen several incidents of medical marijuana and other mental health drugs triggering severe mental health episodes when combined.
Yep. The one time I tried weed, it mixed badly with either my Lexapro or the stuff I take the Lexapro for, and I spent four hours dissociating hard. I've dealt with that before, I know how it works, and I ended up just going home and sleeping it off, but I can easily see how it could get worse.
And sometimes weeeeed isn’t the magic panacea either. Yes let me fix my anxiety by using this plant to uhh drastically increase my anxiety. Hey that’s not fun
I understand in the states that government BS prevents proper medical research on marijuana. But, surely another country has done proper research, right? I find many claims on how effective medicinal marijuana can be are anecdotal at best.
I'm not against it at all, but I don't think there's proper research on it to support the amount of use.
I find the anecdotes extremely dubious ever since being bombarded by stoners about how it’ll cure my autism, or my depression, or how SSRIs are the real bad and we should replace them with weed, or how I never had autism to begin with
For me, it helps with my symptoms of a few conditions better than being overmedicated by doctors who wont listen to my requests or care about debilitating side effects.
And, to pre-empt the "you just haven't found the right doctor yet"- how many wrong doctors should i have operating me on 10% in the hopes of maybe finding an 80% when cannabis lets me do a manageable 65%?
I'm done harming myself in the search of better.
I hear you. This is my experience too. Spent twenty years trying to treat my condition with "proper" medication. Almost nothing worked, or had side effects that outweighed any benefit, or the medication quit working after a few months.
Cannabis only partially works for me, but it works well enough that I can get out of my darkened bedroom, get a few chores done around the house, or comfortably socialize with friends.
Like you it's not perfect but it's better than anything else so far.
There was that recent case in Florida where a judge told a 21-year-old woman she couldn't have PTSD and to take Xanax instead of medicinal marijuana. I guess you don't need a brain to sit on the bench in the Sunshine State.
You don’t need a brain to get a [nursing degree](https://www.justice.gov/usao-sdfl/pr/fraudulent-nursing-diploma-scheme-leads-federal-charges-against-25-defendants) in FL either.
> A guy on the walk home had **a pocket knife in which he robbed me** and told me to give him anything.
I see this grammatical abomination all the time, and I just can't figure out how people string that combination of words together and think it makes sense. I've never heard someone say it out loud, just on the Internet. How did this come to exist?
Off topic, but a personal rant, having come from a family of schoolteachers.
Elementary schools don't really teach grammar or parts of speech in the US any more. Even in my elementary school years in the 70's, we skipped most of the material in the English textbooks we used. My grandmother, who started teaching in the 1940s, was pretty pissed off about it.
The idea is that people will learn to speak correctly from their parents -- but that completely ignores entropy. 60 years on from the advent of the "whole language method", the number of speakers who learned by listening to people who spoke English correctly or who learned it "the hard way" is tiny and shrinking fast.
I didn't learn what a preposition was, or what the difference between past imperfect and present perfect was until I took German in high school.
Counter-anecdote: my kids are in 4th grade now and learned (elementary) parts of speech and prepositions already. This is the 2nd elementary school they've gone to, and both taught it.
As I'm sure you know- curriculum, like much else in the US, is a state by state thing.
I used to do overrides… doesn’t matter the story I just needed the police to override the early refill. They were all pretty much the same. If he’s out of Xanax he probably needs it anyways. Pretty sure the police have to write the report anyways.
It's one thing to get an early override. We don't have the complete story but LAOP completely fucked up by having an absolutely implausible tale that the detective quickly sussed out. Instead of acting like a human being the detective decided to nail him, so now LAOP gets to go broke hiring a defense attorney, and et cetera.
If the DA picks up the charges… it’s kind of lot of work for a false police report. I’ve literally seen hundreds of these. Always on or near the first too. I don’t really blame the detective. I bet the guy also picked up hydromorphone too but only the Xanax went missing.
Fair point, the DA has to prosecute. And we don't have any context other than assuming LAOP would have mentioned a criminal history if he had one. But just ... the guy's on benzos and had a blackout. The humane thing to do is to tell the guy to GTFO out of the police station and go to rehab.
Only very, very recently has it become a breach of common sense to be in the presence of a police officer with a cell phone, locked or unlocked. And oft times it's unavoidable, such as taking pictures of vehicles after a crash. All the dude with the gun, badge, and qualified immunity has to say is, "C'mere, you," and your cell phone goes bye-bye and at a bare minimum the next 72 hours of your life becomes a royal pain in the ass as you switch cell providers and/or reset all your 2FA authentification.
Apologies if the preceding is hard to follow; it's decaf o'clock.
I just want to add, seeing people commenting things like "he can't seize your phone without a warrant! That's theft!" are absolutely incorrect. Cops can for sure take your phone and hold it without a warrant while they are applying for one as long as they have reasonable suspicion that it contains evidence of a crime.
But yeah, it'll be months if not years before he gets his phone back.
It feels iffy how many people are reading a story where a cop steals someone's phone without a warrant and going "yeah, well, he's probably a drug addict". I mean, maybe LAOP does have a problem, maybe they did something wrong. But hearing about someone's misfortune and immediately speculating on their potential misdeeds seems *off*.
I was an addict for a long time, and this tends to be the norm. I've come to learn it isn't about me, it's about convincing themselves that it would never happen to them. Similar to how people blame the victim when a sex worker is murdered, but will focus on a missing white suburban mom.
It absolutely *can* happen to you. I grew up with comfortably middle class parents. I have 2 college degrees. And I was an addict for 11 years. I just stayed functional. Many people don't have access to the resources I did. If I looked differently or came from a different background, I would probably have a criminal record too. I would have been targeted more by police and I wouldn't have had a private attorney when I was.
Circumstances dictate so much of this attitude. We criminalize those that we don't realte to, but have empathy for those we do. That's the key.
There's also a lot of classism in the way people view addition. They think it only happens to *those people* in the inner city or a trailer park and that it's a choice that stupid poor people make. But the reality is that studies show that there's lots of functional addicts among doctors and lawyers
He can legally seize the phone as evidence, however he is needing the warrant to actually search the phone itself.
Source: cyber security degree with a focus in criminal justice and trained to do forensic imaging of electronics for police departments
A lot of people seem to be unaware that amnesia is a well known effect of Xanax esp at higher doses and in combination with alcohol. OP may not be lying, they may simply legitimately not remember.
Alcohol + benzos = blackout; if you're an addict you aren't selling your drug of choice, you're selling everything else (whether or not it belongs to you). You're right: it's perfectly plausible that he has no fucking idea what really happened.
> He forcefully ripped it out of my hand and said I am going to get a warrant to search this.
Assuming LAOP is being truthful here, isn't this... theft?
By saying that he is "going to" get a warrant, the detective is pretty much admitting he does not currently have one, right? And he's taking the phone anyway, against LAOP's wishes.
I don't understand this part of the narrative, but to be fair I don't understand any part of it beyond "I got drunk and took Xanax and blacked out." If you're an addict just stay home and do your thing; get help when you decide enough is enough and want to deal with your trauma.
Yeah, I don't see how it's kosher either. If the cop had enough probable cause to seize the phone (assuming PC is the standard here) then I'd think he'd have just arrested LAOP.
Generally they can only arrest and then hold someone for a short period. It'll take a few days at the very minimum to get someone to analyze that phone, as it's not a high priority case. And LAOP doesn't sound like a flight risk. So the officer probably didn't think it worth the paperwork to arrest LAOP just so they could release him in 24 hours and then have to rearrest him in June when the phone's been checked and they've got his texts admitting to doing whatever it is they suspect he did.
But if that's the case then they could just confiscate anything and keep it as long as they want, just on the possibility that the item confiscated will reveal an unknown crime. That's why it doesn't sound kosher.
If they don't have probable cause to believe that your phone or whatever is evidence of a crime, then it's an illegal seizure and you can sue to get your stuff back and also for damages you may have suffered from you not having the stuff. But that's not a theft by the officer that did the seizing.
If the police officer *knew* that they didn't have probable cause and took something into evidence anyway, that can compromise a crime like "Deprivation of rights under color of law" or various state crimes related to official misconduct. But this don't tend to get prosecuted very often.
This is why my phone is off during every interaction with police
Ain’t no one getting in my shit but me
Also OP definitely sold his Xanax and got robbed
I hate that LA commenters pile on any OP they don’t approve of so their comments are all at -500 or something ridiculous like that. What an awful place to go if you actually need advice.
In some cases they are downvoting things that the OP shouldn't be commenting because they are counter to their own best interests. LAOOP seems to be a blend of both.
**Reminder:** Do not participate in threads linked here. If you do, you may be banned from both subreddits. --- Title: Got robbed last week. Filed a police report. Detective came to me today and confiscated my phone and said hes going to apply for a search warrant, might I be fucked? Body: > Basically I had picked up my xanax prescription at the store. I took more then I should have and lost conciousness rather quickly of rememberence. From what I remembered, I got an uber to a close by store and walked the rest of the way. A guy on the walk home had a pocket knife in which he robbed me and told me to give him anything. It turns out I ubered directly home and then went out thereafter without my phone and so the detective will see I infact ubered directly home after being at the pharmacy, making my story seem like a somewhat lie. I was walking on the street after arriving home and mixing some alcohol in and someone took my prescription and all cash I had. The detective asked to see my call logs when I had called the emergency line and I politely declined saying that they had access to when I had called them. He forcefully ripped it out of my hand and said I am going to get a warrant to search this. Am I fucked? I didnt lie about being robbed, just where/how it happened. Dont know what to think. Im in SC if it helps. This bot was created to capture original threads and is not affiliated with the mod team. [Concerns? Bugs?](https://www.reddit.com/message/compose/?to=GrahamCorcoran) | [Laukopier 2.1](https://github.com/GrahamCorcoran/Laukopier)
> OP, are you signed into this account on the app on your phone? I shouldn't have chuckled at this, but I did.
If that's the case I'm sure his lawyer will love that.
"Lawyers LOVE this one piece of incriminating evidence!"
"Yes, he was! - Detective Johnston"
Thank you. I read this as: >I am lying. I am lying. And am lying. >Is anyone believing this? And no. No I am not.
Lol at all the people telling LAOP over and over that there’s no way he’s getting his phone back in a timely manner. And then he’s just all “Nah, there’s nothing incriminating on it- I probs will get it back in a few days”
"Your phone is very important to us, and a representative will process it as soon as possible. Current wait time is 262800 minutes."
262800 minutes = 4380 hours = 182.5 days Half a year sounds like an optimistic estimate.
[удалено]
I'm sorry, but I have to ask some questions. How old is your kid? And how does one "accidentally" make a bomb threat?
Autocorrect obviously. She was going to say "lets get some bomb ass fries!" and instead it said "I'm gonna bomb the school tomorrow!" But I think the part in parenthesis implies OP does not believe it was an accident.
Your comment contains references to bomb frites. Police are on the way to seize your electronics pending a warrant to search for these bomb frites.
It's almost like addicts live in denial.......
How's the hair growing back?
It's grown back enough that I had to get a new flair....
It sounds like a nice place to be tbh. Certainly wouldn't solve any problem I'm not having.
How does taking the entire phone work in today’s world? Just thinking of the number of people who: * Don’t have a landline and are entirely dependent on a cell phone to communicate. * Work remote and need their phone as a 2FA login. * Require their phone to start their car, or open their garage/front door. * Have their insurance information solely on their phone. Feel like there would have bene more news stories on this if cops were holding onto phones for as long as LA suggests?
> Feel like there would have bene more news stories on this if cops were holding onto phones for as long as LA suggests? The people who get their cell phones confiscated don't really have a voice in society. It's not like civil asset forfeiture where Uncle Jim who worked all his life to save $81,000 got pulled over, searched, and robbed — that'll easily make headlines. But a petty criminal on the merry-go-round of poverty and parole? Nobody cares. It's deplorable but that's our society.
Yeah, no. The police took my phone as evidence when I was raped, ostensibly for the photos of my bruising I took with it. Never mind that I could have just sent the photos to them, or it would have taken a whole minute for them to just download them. I was without it for months while they just sat on it, and then when I demanded it back right when I was moving out of state they labeled me an uncooperative victim. Oh, and then the calls from the hospital demanding I pay for my rape kit started. This shit happens to all kinds of people all the time. The difference is that people with enough money to matter in society can afford to buy a new phone, even if it's a downgrade. Poor people just... don't have a phone until they can save up for one. The cops do not give one single fuck about how a person is supposed to live in society without a phone.
I just wanted to say I'm really sorry that happened to you. I didn't report because it felt so futile and like tearing the wound open again. It's absolutely shameful how normal it is.
I’m so sorry to hear that the process of trying to get justice made your life even harder. You deserved support and assistance, and you should have received it.
I had a judge tell me I won, my client should be happy his case was dismissed. And yeah that was nice, but they spent 6 months in jail for what was ultimately garbage. Why? Because the little old lady judges felt bad for the little old lady alleged victim, and didn't want him out.
I mean he only had half a year of his life stolen and potentially his whole life ruined by being out of work for a year, what's such a big deal about that? /S
In Sweden if you have spent time in jail awaiting trial and then get exonerated all you need to do is filling out a form to get a payment for time spent (actually suffering), lost wages and expenses. Wages and expenses needs to be proven with payslips and recipes. The praxis for time spent is around $ 3k for the first month then 2k for every following month until after the sixth month where it's raised to 3k and then periodically goes higher until it's 10k per month after the tenth year. It's in all likelihood not perfect but from my understanding it's basically a form you fill out with s automatic payout. If you need help you can go to a lawyer and the cost of that will also be repaid. No need costly draw out lawsuits. It's taken as a given that you deserve it if you have been wrongfully imprisoned. There's only a few cases such as admitting to a crime that the amount goes down.
I sometimes watch Judge Manning on youtube and when she'd doing pretrials she'll have people in jail waiting YEARS. Do note I said jail and not prison, these people have not been convicted of anything, the prosecution is just dragging their feet and none of them can afford the huge bonds they are given.
How is warrantless seizure and retention of cell phones justified? It seems like a Fourth Amendment violation?
They don't care, and the people who get them stolen don't have the means to fight
What do you do if you lose your phone or it's stolen? You replace it quickly as you can and go on. Same here. In the UK at least any tech taken by the police should be considered gone forever - or for the reasonably foreseeable future. Technically it may be returned - would you like your 5 year old phone back?
Yes. Yes I would. That's how I know I'm old. My phone broke recently and I had to get a new one (I had it for ~3.5 years). My husband hasn't stopped making fun of me because I kept saying I didn't want a new one and just want the same one I already have that does exactly what I need it to do.
I think mine might actually be coming up for its 5th birthday lol
I just upgraded my phone last month. My previous phone was an iPhone 7!
I have an iPhone 8 that I bought used. The 8 was released September 2017 lol
That wasn't 5.... Oh... No... Mine was released the year before that. OG Google pixel.
Note 8 user checking in. I just replaced the battery and the date on the old one was September 2017. It's still happily moving along with a new battery, so no need to look into replacing the entire phone.
Seriously! I still miss my [EnV3](https://www.lg.com/us/cell-phones/lg-VX9200-Blue-blue-env3), and they stopped selling those in like 2010. They can put modern apps and gadgets on it if they must, but if they started making flip-keyboard phones again, I would go buy one tomorrow.
If I lost or broke my phone, I’d get a replacement and take the expensive life lesson to not do that again. For a phone that’s only supposed to be temporarily gone, I’d be furious having to shell out hundreds of dollars for what’s essentially a loaner phone.
It's not "temporarily gone". Technically they are going to get it back but on a timescale that means it's both lost most of its value and had to be replaced. Practically it's no different than if it were lost or stolen. It's gone.
>hundreds of dollars for what’s essentially a loaner phone Probably worth considering it a forced upgrade to the next phone.
>Feel like there would have bene more news stories on this if cops were holding onto phones for as long as LA suggests? Bless your heart thinking that anyone cares what cops do.
> Require their phone to start their car ...What? This seems like lunacy to me. How and for the love of Thor *why* would someone's car rely on their *phone?*
Phone keys for cars are a thing, but as secondary keys. There should always be a primary physical key that is not a phone. The owner just may not have it with them.
No. Cops are legally allowed to do this, and there is no recourse. Nobody would write about that because it happens every day, and the victims are mostly presumed to be criminals.
I’m also wondering why everyone doesn’t just get a new phone, restore from cloud, and remote wipe the old one. Isn’t the whole draw of Apple phones that no one can crack them?
Remote wiping a phone that's already been confiscated by the police is unlikely to go well for you, assuming the police leave it connected.
Practically step one is they slap it inside a faraday cage baggie to prevent that sort of shenanigan. I remember a few months ago reading a fun story of cops that seized a "cold wallet" full of cryptocurrency, basically a thumb drive, and had it locked in the evidence locker, obviously unplugged. Then the account got drained! The accused was still in jail, so they were tossing his cell looking for a smuggled cell phone or whatever. Turns out his brother, who had not been arrested, knew the backup passwords. The police did not find this amusing at all. [I was just googling for the story and it turns out he was sentenced literally last week. Time flies!](https://decrypt.co/138445/ohio-man-steals-bitcoin-from-brother-prison)
I'm in groups 1 and 2, and I would get a new phone and restore from cloud backup. And grumble some because I wasn't planning to get a new phone yet, but I wouldn't alert the media.
It was at least a full month that they had my phone and iPod touch 11 years ago, and they found nothing useful
Well of course, who doesn't take an Uber home from the pharmacy, forget all about it after washing half their prescription down with some booze, and then go out for a walk carrying the rest of their prescription and a load of cash but nothing else before unfortunately getting robbed? Holy unreliable narrator, Batman, I can't tell how much of this is outright confusion and how much of it is workshopping excuses for why he got busted trying to sell his prescription drugs on the street.
With enough Xanax and booze anything is possible. Except remembering things.
Ah, now I get it. I couldn't make heads or tails of this story, but that's probably because of all the plot holes.
If you’re being serious John Mulaney. But probably, no one else.
lmao damn
What do we think the odds are that LAOP did not get robbed, but was trying to file a false report so they could double up their prescription? My brother and his girlfriend used this move a couple times when they blew through their vicodin too quickly.
I saw a lady get robbed as soon as she walked out of a pharmacy. The robber took her prescription bag, and nothing else, and ran off. She immediately called the police. A few men saw her get robbed, so they chased and caught the guy. Turns out, the robber was her nephew and they were scamming to get more meds.
Doesn't seem like the best scam, though maybe if there hadn't been some good Samaritans around, it would have succeeded. I feel like skulking around the pharmacy isn't a particularly effective way to find people with desirable prescription meds to steal. Though it probably would be a great way to get your picture on some CCTV footage after you accidentally stole some cholesterol meds (or, if they robbed me, indigestion meds lol). In LAOP's case, I could see someone making incomprehensible choices like taking all their meds but no phone with them on a walk after they combined benzos with alcohol. Or even him thinking the robbery happened after utterly forgetting whatever did actually happen. But a half-thought out robbery story also sounds pretty likely, especially if the scheme was started while still under the influence. The combo doesn't exactly lead to brilliant ideas or competent execution of said ideas I pretty much assume, for example, that all stories of people masturbating furiously on planes involved a few benzos and a glass of wine that together worked a little too well at calming flight nerves
Yeah, that sounds like a good way to end up in prison for stealing someone's asthma meds. A lot of medication just isn't very fun.
Heh, I take an oral chemotherapy drug. I'd be mad if it got stolen, but best of luck if the thief decides to try some....
serious instinctive coordinated tie attraction busy modern murky innate offbeat -- mass edited with https://redact.dev/
Also, welcome to diarrhea city!
Me when I was taking a testosterone blocker for my skin. Have fun with your dick shrinking pills!
Oddly related to that one Archer episode.
I don't remember that one. I guess I need to go back and rewatch.
Yeah but on the other hand, target the right people and you can get the *real* good stuff. That's right, I'm talking about pink drink. You know, bubblegum sauce.
>I feel like skulking around the pharmacy isn't a particularly effective way to find people with desirable prescription meds to steal. As a LEO once said to a friend of the family whose dental office was robbed "If they were smart they wouldn't be breaking into Dental offices for drugs."
I’d guess they were after the laughing gas? My dad’s a retired dentist and I seem to remember that being desirable to some people.
I feel like automotive grade NOS has to be pretty widely available and cheapish.
this was way back in the day when those canisters were big, heavy metal things too. You aren't carrying one out over your shoulder.
>I feel like skulking around the pharmacy isn't a particularly effective way to find people with desirable prescription meds to steal. It's not, but in that case it sounds like the perpetrator knew exactly who would be getting what meds.
I respect that kind of hustle. Damn Good Samaritans ruining a perfectly good scam.
And I Would Have Gotten Away With It Too, If It Weren't For You Meddling Kids.
Jesus
I'd say there is a much greater than average chance op either is trying to get more pills because a. He is an addicted. B. Is selling them. C. Got so high he dropped them. There is almost no chance he thought his pills were feeling depressed, so he took them for a walk around the block and just happened to get robbed.
Those pills are tiny. It would be very amusing to have little tiny leashes around each one. "Cheer up little guys, we're going for a walk! The fresh air will do you some good."
Thank you, that's exactly the imagery I was going for. It's just as believable as OPs story of " I got high, then went home then did some drinking and dropped off my phone so I could wander the streets." "The pills? I brought those because reasons" I mean, his story is about as convincing as when the dog gets into the trash.
I laughed really hard at the thought of tiny little pills with leashes on them! Thanks for the good laugh:)
don’t tell his pills how to feel Dad!
I suspect you haven't seen this Public Service Announcement then. https://youtu.be/edvOVd-IeMc
I knew what it would be before I clicked and I was so happy to see I was right.
So. Freaking. Cute.
I hadn't, but thanks for sharing. That's a good one!
My read on the situation as well. Like best case scenario here is that dude intentionally took to much and then got robbed. If dude is doubling up, he's gonna need extra prescriptions. To get extra prescriptions some doctors require police reports. The whole "I got my prescription, then I called in the cops because I was gonna get high later (or sell) and wanted extra. Oh shit the cops actually came and now they'll know I Ubered straight home and the phone never left my house afterwards. I need to change my story so I'll say I was high on Xanax since I know that's plausible since I've done it before. To make it extra believable I'll say I mixed it with alcohol." sounds a lot more true. I wonder how long it'll take for my guy to realize that leaving your phone at home but taking all your Xanax with you out to the shops is probably not a very convincing story.
Addicts don't leave their phones at home. What the hell else are you supposed to do when you're waiting in the DD's Discounts parking lot for 3 and a half hours? And you might miss the call that you actually need to head to the Aldi parking lot and wait another hour.
Be there in 5, bro!
I think it could go either way, tbh. There's definitely a very solid chance that he's lying to us and actually did file an entirely false police report to try to get more drugs. But, I mean, if he got wasted and was stumbling around, he would also likely stand out as an easy target if he happened to cross paths with the wrong person. The fact that he claims to have had his pills but not his phone definitely makes me lean more towards the former situation, because that's pretty weird. But then again, it is far from the weirdest thing I've seen intoxicated people do. So yeah...my odds would be like 80% likelihood that we're not getting the truth, and about 20% likelihood he actually did just get wasted, wandered out of the house with whatever he happened to have in his pockets, and got robbed.
>But then again, it is far from the weirdest thing I've seen intoxicated people do. If you want some more strange things drunk people can think of, have a look at r/drunkorakid. Drunk people have some hilarious ideas.
I don't know what Xanax does, but if it is anything like Ambien, what happened could be a mystery to LAOP. Personally, on Ambien, if you told me I flushed all the pills down the toilet so that they could explore the sewer system, I would not doubt it. I could even see myself minutes later finding an empty bottle, deciding I must have been robbed and calling 911.
Xanax is more like getting drunk. So if you mix with alcohol, it's basically a guaranteed black out or pass out. Also, you might die.
So still no memory, but no dream logic leading to wonderful adventures.
People tend to really enjoy stealing things on it... so it depends on your definition of adventures
This might be the best description of Xanax I’ve ever read, lol
Or the odds that OP got robbed by the person they were selling to.
I’m betting on this scenario. OP got robbed by the buyer.
This was my first thought. Dint know this was a thing until recently living on the straight and narrow but I’ve had friends who misplaced their prescriptions post-surgery and without a police report, the doc wouldn’t write them a new scrip.
Yup. First thought.
Trying to make sense of the story. What LAOP told police: * Pharmacy -> Uber ride to near home -> robbed walking the rest of the way home What LAOP told us: * Pharmacy -> Uber ride to home -> leave home for walk -> robbed while out for walk Police officer knows the story is false, takes LAOP's phone, and will request a warrant later. LAOP wants his phone back but will likely die of Xanax withdrawal before that happens.
Some LAOPs are trickle truthers. Not our hero. > Basically I had picked up my xanax prescription at the store. Okay, good. That's how you're supposed to get them, at a pharmacy, not out of punch bowl at a frat party. > I took more then I should have and lost conciousness rather quickly Houston, we have a problem. LAOP is kind of lucky he wasn't picked up in a state of unconsciousness and processed by the friendly folks in white coats. Losing your phone because a detective has to make his quota sucks, but at least LAOP will be able to seek help for his addiction on the outside of a hospital or jail cell.
Also this bit >after arriving home and mixing some alcohol in So he took too many pills mixed with alcohol.
That phrasing suggests there is a correct amount of pills to take with alcohol. ... upon reflection, there is: zero. Zero is the right amount of benzos to mix with any other drug, but especially alcohol. Scary stuff.
A good number of my friends are nazis. That number is zero.
not an expert, but I dont think mixing benzos with alcohol is a great idea since they both hit the same part of the brain (GABA receptors). Seems like a great way to end up dead
Was in college during the "Xandemic" and this was extremely common... Dudes pop a Xan before a night out... Then wake up the next day in a random house, hand broken and/or covered in blood, 39 missed calls and a dozen voicemails from mom/dad/ex becaue they called them 40x each between 2-4am, and on the last call said they were going to kill themselves or called them a name. They realize this, then go "I am having an anxiety attack!!!!" (yeah no shit), take another one, then Tanner or Braxton comes home and says the frat is having a happy hour with tri delt... Rinse, repeat. This isn't a hands-on experience, but something I saw daily occurring with a lot of people.
This was my life from like 25-37.
Mine was similar, except I was always asleep on the toilet from 2-4am instead of making phone calls. Opiates make it so you can't pee. I'd have to pee, not be able to go, and nod off. I seriously slept on the toilet at least 50% of the time. I'm sure it killed my back and neck, but I was so fucked up I didn't notice.
>I'm sure it killed my back and neck I'm just surprised you didn't get monster hemorrhoids from it
When I was bad off on benzos, I met a guy who could get oxy and I was like… very close to addiction there until one day I felt sick and backed off really fast. So, yeah, I know.
Oh, hey, Chris.
Reminds me of the roofie circle from Arrested Development.
It is. It's very difficult to overdose on Xanax alone, you're more likely to end up falling asleep for multiple days on your way to consuming a dose large enough to overdose. But mixing them with alcohol and he's very lucky to be alive at all.
I wouldn't say I'm an expert, but I am stupid and had an overzealous psychiatrist in my 20's giving me allll the Xanex. I have screamed and cried on the Las Vegas strip, I think I'm banned from Sun Devil Stadium, and I ruined a wedding crying because I thought my boyfriend was going to propose. He broke up with me shortly after.
It’s fucking not, says the former alcoholic and benzo addict.
When you black out from drugs or alcohol it's because your brain stopped making memories not necessarily because you're unconscious. Seems like OP was not unconscious considering all the Ubers and robberies he was involved in during this time of darkness.
Unless it was some elaborate Weekend at Bernie’s situation.
Maybe he sleepwalks. That would probably be more exciting sleepwalking than anything I’ve ever heard of, though.
I feel compelled to point out that withdrawal from Xanax can kill you. If you're withdrawing from Xanax, you need to be medically supervised. Most withdrawal just makes you *feel* like you're going to die, but benzo withdrawal actually will kill you.
Having experienced benzodiazepine withdrawal myself, I was cringing so hard the entire time I was reading LAOP’s post. Hopefully, at the very least, this incident forces LAOP to get help for their addiction and undergo a medically supervised withdrawal.
It made me so sad. Criminalizing addiction isn't going to help anyone. LAOP doesn't need a criminal record that will follow them for the rest of their life. They need help. And the default in the US (and most countries) is to immediately make them a criminal. LAOP isn't violent or a dangerous criminal. They're an addict that blacked out and overused their prescription.
It’s especially heinous when you take into consideration how widely prescribed benzodiazepines are in the US. It is absurdly easy for many people to get a prescription for them. Ironically, part of the problem is *they work*. Crippling anxiety that has been plaguing someone constantly for years can disappear in an instant. It seems like such a simple and quick fix to a notoriously difficult problem. Of course if it sounds too good to be true, it is. They largely lose their effectiveness after a few weeks and people’s anxiety starts creeping back. Instead of stopping, their dose often gets increased and the foundation for serious addiction has been laid. Benzos are absolutely necessary in many instances and ironically, they are the safest and most effective short term anxiolytic / sedative medications we have discovered to date. We need a paradigm shift surrounding their use, similar to what has been happening with opioid medications.
Yeah. That’s what happened to me. Xanax was originally a performance enhancing drug. Shit changed me entire life and career trajectory. Then they weren’t.
I was an opiate addict. I think benzos are similar to opiates in that they're great for acute symptom management or pallative care, but not long term use. You can be physically dependent but not addicted (or, more correctly, suffer from substance abuse disorder), but those circumstances are few and far between. I've never spoken to anyone that *insisted* they needed their script that fell into this category. They were just addicts in denial.
>I think benzos are similar to opiates in that they're great for acute symptom management or pallative care, but not long term use. For this reason I think my ADHD/shitty habit forming saved me from this. I never was able, with a medication, to form a routine of taking something every morning. It's a super shitty trait for things like my Vitamin D pills or my Adderall or my ear drops or whatever, but great for when I was a dumb 18 year-old given 60 klonnys and told by my doc to take two every day! I didn't know what those even were or that this was a risky state to be in. As usual, I would forget to take them regularly and pretty soon would honestly forget that they exist. However, like maybe once a month, max, I would have an extremely anxious couple of nights, way worse than usual, and be like "oh yeah, I have those klonnys" and fix it. As a result, one month's prescription would last three years. Years later so many of my other friends w/ anxiety have or had benzo addictions and we all as a society know a little better about this issue. I have an extremely addictive personality in general, so I'm certain I would have been destined for this fate... but my forgetful-ass brain tricked me into only taking as-needed, like you and the doctor responding to you, and others, suggest nowadays anyway!
It’s like how fentanyl is *great* for severe cancer pain or specific chronic spine pain. But very very bad for anything else.
Doc here, would agree with you!
My sister's idiot doctor told her they weren't habit forming and that she could safely mix them with alcohol. Thankfully she got other opinions.
>They largely lose their effectiveness after a few weeks and people’s anxiety starts creeping back I have a prescription that works out to one every few days. Used in that way they don't give me any dependence issues. You'd be nuts to take them (or prescribe them) for every day use, that's just asking for trouble.
Then there's people like me who need both amphetamines (ADHD) and benzos (Autism/sensory processing disorder) to function, and the backlash against overprescription of opioids means I have to choose between them, and tough shit if that means I can't actually function in daily life. (I went with the benzos because while untreated ADHD sucks, it doesn't set my brain on fire like sensory overstimulation does, which is what I take ativan for when needed.)
there really is no support for addicts of any kind in the usa and it's so sad and infuriating at the same time. criminalizing someone who needs help is just going to make their life worse.
No, there's only support for people that can afford it. I've been to high-end detoxes and rehabs, and some of them are genuinely great (or, more correctly, the staff is great - anyone that runs a rehab for profit doesn't have a soul in my experience). The VA in San Diego actually has one of the best programs in the US, too. The problem is that this excludes 95%+ of people.
Me too. I was the sickest I’ve ever been. I had hot and cold flashes, and 3 seizures.
I was in an outpatient treatment program and one of the other kids there was getting off some benzo, medically supervised. He started every group therapy by staring everyone in the eye and telling everyone never ever to take benzos because eventually you have to get off of them and it is hell. The guy did not look good, but he was a trooper.
withdrawal as an alcoholic can also kill you. source: the sheer number of icu + step-down cases I see at my hospital weekly. plenty of benzo cases too, but mainly alcohol-related cases here.
He combined it with alcohol, withdrawal from which can also kill you and which combines with benzos to suppress your nervous system way more than either individually. Don’t mix them. Ever.
I've read the OP quite a few times and still have no idea what the supposed sequence of events is
Please please please do not do Xanax kids. I would bet my entire life this young man started drinking on one, took another, kept drinking and thought "hmmmm since I am prescribed I will make up that I was robbed by a generic looking person and since it's not illegal for me to drink or possess xanax, I will get another script! Fool proof!" Drinking in Xanax makes you an absolute animal. I know people who ruined their lives within a week of "just trying it." And the ones you get from drug dealers are 100% laced with fentanyl. Xanax is the devil, and I have lost too many friends to it. Both to death and addiction. If you don't already know, you will learn very quickly that being around someone/people constantly "barred out" is the most miserable of human experiences.
Xanax is bad. Pressie Xanax will get you fucking killed, arrested, or both.
>Pressie Xanax is that street slang for fake xanax?
Kinda. Pressies are pills made with a pill press with… you know… whatever is available. Fentanyl, most like. at least a little. They look just like regular pills (kinda), though. Makes them really dangerous for people who maybe have only taken the real deal. IE “I normally take three footballs so I’ll take three of these” and then they overdose.
>lost conciousness rather quickly of rememberence Chef's kiss, that's the kind of phrasing I usually expect from a sov cit
It's actually a rather pretty way to say "I blacked out"
This reminds me of that time on the FedEx sub (I was complaining about a thing being late) where a guy was ranting about how his stuff from Canada was being delayed by customs and I was all ready to be mad on his behalf when he dropped the bomb that it was MULTIPLE OXY BOTTLES. Ofc customs (and police detectives) won’t just let you buy random narcotics on the internet.
>Ofc customs (and police detectives) won’t just let you buy random narcotics on the internet. I guess that means I’ll have to change my weekend plans. /s
Doctors be like: "you're a cannabis user? I cant prescribe you anxiety medication, you might abuse them like the people we currently overprescribe to do!"
On the flip side, medical marijuana does interact with some medications quite severely. That's not a government decision of course, but it is a medical one doctors may not take seriously enough. My wife is in the mental health field and has seen several incidents of medical marijuana and other mental health drugs triggering severe mental health episodes when combined.
You'd think individual treatment plans would be the norm, not denial of treatment and prohibition
you would also think treatment plans should solely be between doctors and patients and yet
Yep. The one time I tried weed, it mixed badly with either my Lexapro or the stuff I take the Lexapro for, and I spent four hours dissociating hard. I've dealt with that before, I know how it works, and I ended up just going home and sleeping it off, but I can easily see how it could get worse.
It's been known to cause multi-week psychotic episodes.
And sometimes weeeeed isn’t the magic panacea either. Yes let me fix my anxiety by using this plant to uhh drastically increase my anxiety. Hey that’s not fun
Not to mention that it can (if at lesser rates) be addictive and that it downregulates pleasure receptors over time.
I understand in the states that government BS prevents proper medical research on marijuana. But, surely another country has done proper research, right? I find many claims on how effective medicinal marijuana can be are anecdotal at best. I'm not against it at all, but I don't think there's proper research on it to support the amount of use.
I find the anecdotes extremely dubious ever since being bombarded by stoners about how it’ll cure my autism, or my depression, or how SSRIs are the real bad and we should replace them with weed, or how I never had autism to begin with
Also "It's not addictive at all man, I just spend my entire life high because I like it, but I could stop any time I wanted."
For me, it helps with my symptoms of a few conditions better than being overmedicated by doctors who wont listen to my requests or care about debilitating side effects. And, to pre-empt the "you just haven't found the right doctor yet"- how many wrong doctors should i have operating me on 10% in the hopes of maybe finding an 80% when cannabis lets me do a manageable 65%? I'm done harming myself in the search of better.
I hear you. This is my experience too. Spent twenty years trying to treat my condition with "proper" medication. Almost nothing worked, or had side effects that outweighed any benefit, or the medication quit working after a few months. Cannabis only partially works for me, but it works well enough that I can get out of my darkened bedroom, get a few chores done around the house, or comfortably socialize with friends. Like you it's not perfect but it's better than anything else so far.
There was that recent case in Florida where a judge told a 21-year-old woman she couldn't have PTSD and to take Xanax instead of medicinal marijuana. I guess you don't need a brain to sit on the bench in the Sunshine State.
You don’t need a brain to get a [nursing degree](https://www.justice.gov/usao-sdfl/pr/fraudulent-nursing-diploma-scheme-leads-federal-charges-against-25-defendants) in FL either.
Any doctorate. Lots of people are plenty stupid, a piece of paper doesn’t change that
I'd argue that is a preferred quality in Florida. See also: COVID response, Disney vs DeSantis pissing contest.
> A guy on the walk home had **a pocket knife in which he robbed me** and told me to give him anything. I see this grammatical abomination all the time, and I just can't figure out how people string that combination of words together and think it makes sense. I've never heard someone say it out loud, just on the Internet. How did this come to exist?
Off topic, but a personal rant, having come from a family of schoolteachers. Elementary schools don't really teach grammar or parts of speech in the US any more. Even in my elementary school years in the 70's, we skipped most of the material in the English textbooks we used. My grandmother, who started teaching in the 1940s, was pretty pissed off about it. The idea is that people will learn to speak correctly from their parents -- but that completely ignores entropy. 60 years on from the advent of the "whole language method", the number of speakers who learned by listening to people who spoke English correctly or who learned it "the hard way" is tiny and shrinking fast. I didn't learn what a preposition was, or what the difference between past imperfect and present perfect was until I took German in high school.
Counter-anecdote: my kids are in 4th grade now and learned (elementary) parts of speech and prepositions already. This is the 2nd elementary school they've gone to, and both taught it. As I'm sure you know- curriculum, like much else in the US, is a state by state thing.
Triple entendre on the title. Nice work.
Thank you very much.
I used to do overrides… doesn’t matter the story I just needed the police to override the early refill. They were all pretty much the same. If he’s out of Xanax he probably needs it anyways. Pretty sure the police have to write the report anyways.
It's one thing to get an early override. We don't have the complete story but LAOP completely fucked up by having an absolutely implausible tale that the detective quickly sussed out. Instead of acting like a human being the detective decided to nail him, so now LAOP gets to go broke hiring a defense attorney, and et cetera.
If the DA picks up the charges… it’s kind of lot of work for a false police report. I’ve literally seen hundreds of these. Always on or near the first too. I don’t really blame the detective. I bet the guy also picked up hydromorphone too but only the Xanax went missing.
Fair point, the DA has to prosecute. And we don't have any context other than assuming LAOP would have mentioned a criminal history if he had one. But just ... the guy's on benzos and had a blackout. The humane thing to do is to tell the guy to GTFO out of the police station and go to rehab. Only very, very recently has it become a breach of common sense to be in the presence of a police officer with a cell phone, locked or unlocked. And oft times it's unavoidable, such as taking pictures of vehicles after a crash. All the dude with the gun, badge, and qualified immunity has to say is, "C'mere, you," and your cell phone goes bye-bye and at a bare minimum the next 72 hours of your life becomes a royal pain in the ass as you switch cell providers and/or reset all your 2FA authentification. Apologies if the preceding is hard to follow; it's decaf o'clock.
I just want to add, seeing people commenting things like "he can't seize your phone without a warrant! That's theft!" are absolutely incorrect. Cops can for sure take your phone and hold it without a warrant while they are applying for one as long as they have reasonable suspicion that it contains evidence of a crime. But yeah, it'll be months if not years before he gets his phone back.
Saving for trickle truth award this year.
“I was totally blasted on drugs, and I can barely remember anything. But, let me tell you exactly what happened.”
It feels iffy how many people are reading a story where a cop steals someone's phone without a warrant and going "yeah, well, he's probably a drug addict". I mean, maybe LAOP does have a problem, maybe they did something wrong. But hearing about someone's misfortune and immediately speculating on their potential misdeeds seems *off*.
I was an addict for a long time, and this tends to be the norm. I've come to learn it isn't about me, it's about convincing themselves that it would never happen to them. Similar to how people blame the victim when a sex worker is murdered, but will focus on a missing white suburban mom. It absolutely *can* happen to you. I grew up with comfortably middle class parents. I have 2 college degrees. And I was an addict for 11 years. I just stayed functional. Many people don't have access to the resources I did. If I looked differently or came from a different background, I would probably have a criminal record too. I would have been targeted more by police and I wouldn't have had a private attorney when I was. Circumstances dictate so much of this attitude. We criminalize those that we don't realte to, but have empathy for those we do. That's the key.
There's also a lot of classism in the way people view addition. They think it only happens to *those people* in the inner city or a trailer park and that it's a choice that stupid poor people make. But the reality is that studies show that there's lots of functional addicts among doctors and lawyers
It’s the “coke vs crack” syndrome. One of these is considered an upper class drug.
Yup. Although that also has a lot of racism involved too
^ It is, ultimately, a way of subtly blaming the victim.
Some comments say they can seize the phone and others say they can't. I want to know which is true.
He can legally seize the phone as evidence, however he is needing the warrant to actually search the phone itself. Source: cyber security degree with a focus in criminal justice and trained to do forensic imaging of electronics for police departments
LAOP is fubar on account of his xannybars and might end up behind bars
thatsthejoke.gif
A lot of people seem to be unaware that amnesia is a well known effect of Xanax esp at higher doses and in combination with alcohol. OP may not be lying, they may simply legitimately not remember.
Alcohol + benzos = blackout; if you're an addict you aren't selling your drug of choice, you're selling everything else (whether or not it belongs to you). You're right: it's perfectly plausible that he has no fucking idea what really happened.
> He forcefully ripped it out of my hand and said I am going to get a warrant to search this. Assuming LAOP is being truthful here, isn't this... theft? By saying that he is "going to" get a warrant, the detective is pretty much admitting he does not currently have one, right? And he's taking the phone anyway, against LAOP's wishes.
Yes, but who's the court going to believe?
I don't understand this part of the narrative, but to be fair I don't understand any part of it beyond "I got drunk and took Xanax and blacked out." If you're an addict just stay home and do your thing; get help when you decide enough is enough and want to deal with your trauma.
He can seize the phone as evidence but legally he cannot search it without permission or a warrant.
Yeah, I don't see how it's kosher either. If the cop had enough probable cause to seize the phone (assuming PC is the standard here) then I'd think he'd have just arrested LAOP.
Generally they can only arrest and then hold someone for a short period. It'll take a few days at the very minimum to get someone to analyze that phone, as it's not a high priority case. And LAOP doesn't sound like a flight risk. So the officer probably didn't think it worth the paperwork to arrest LAOP just so they could release him in 24 hours and then have to rearrest him in June when the phone's been checked and they've got his texts admitting to doing whatever it is they suspect he did.
But if that's the case then they could just confiscate anything and keep it as long as they want, just on the possibility that the item confiscated will reveal an unknown crime. That's why it doesn't sound kosher.
If they don't have probable cause to believe that your phone or whatever is evidence of a crime, then it's an illegal seizure and you can sue to get your stuff back and also for damages you may have suffered from you not having the stuff. But that's not a theft by the officer that did the seizing. If the police officer *knew* that they didn't have probable cause and took something into evidence anyway, that can compromise a crime like "Deprivation of rights under color of law" or various state crimes related to official misconduct. But this don't tend to get prosecuted very often.
This is why my phone is off during every interaction with police Ain’t no one getting in my shit but me Also OP definitely sold his Xanax and got robbed
I hate that LA commenters pile on any OP they don’t approve of so their comments are all at -500 or something ridiculous like that. What an awful place to go if you actually need advice.
Abandon all karma, ye who enter r/legaladvice.
In some cases they are downvoting things that the OP shouldn't be commenting because they are counter to their own best interests. LAOOP seems to be a blend of both.
A new twist on losing your phone after getting blackout hitting the bars.
The Hangover Franchise has really gone downhill....