Elsmere police ask drug dealers to snitch on each other

Police in Elsmere are asking drug dealers to rat out competitors who are cutting into their sales.

That may sound like a goof, Police Chief Laura M. Giles said, but it's working.

In a new Facebook post, the Elsmere Bureau of Police on Tuesday posted a form that makes no mistake about who it's aimed to reach.

"ATTENTION DRUG DEALERS," the form says in capital letters.

"Is your drug dealing competition costing you money?" the form asks. "Would you like to eliminate that problem?"

What follows is a series of fill-in-the-blanks:

My competition is:

My competition lives at:

My competition's cell is:

My competition sells drugs at:

The form then directs drug dealers to snitch on their competition at townofelsmere.com.

Tips may be given under the town website's "Requests/Complaints" heading, with tipsters directed to select the police department, then provide their information.

The idea is borrowed from Texas, where the chief's son Josh goes to college.

He saw the form posted on social media by a police department there and suggested his mother copy it for Elsmere, she said.

"I thought, 'Wow, that's pretty cool,' " she said, adding that with all the attention on social media, such an appeal was worth a try.

In less than 24 hours of having the form posted, Giles said, two dealers already have reported their competition to police – and investigations are underway.

Elsmere leaders understand that drug addicts have a disease but they want to stop dealers who prey on them, she said, adding, "We're aiming for the head of the snake."

Contact robin brown at (302) 324-2856 or rbrown@delawareonline.com. Find her on Facebook and follow her on Twitter @rbrowndelaware.