Pubdate: Sat, 27 Dec 2003
Source: Athens Banner-Herald (GA)
Copyright: 2003 Athens Newspapers Inc
Contact:  http://www.onlineathens.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/1535
Author: Teresa Stepzinski

MANY DRUG TRAFFICKERS FELL TO RETIRED COP

BRUNSWICK - Ray Starling built his career on secrecy. Many a night, he 
dozed on a surplus Army cot in a small, dingy office, waiting for word of 
someone looking to buy or sell some marijuana, heroin, crystal 
methamphetamine or cocaine. He has spent hours hunkered down in woods, 
cloaked in darkness and mosquitoes, patiently waiting for smugglers to come 
ashore with a clandestine cargo of pot. And for 30 years, Starling's 
easygoing demeanor and disarming grin were the downfall of more than a few 
drug traffickers. ''One of the things that I'm going to miss,'' he said, 
''is the thrill and excitement of knowing that if you're a dope dealer and 
I've just bought from you ... you don't know it yet, but you're going to 
get busted.'' Starling, 54, retired this month from the Glynn County Police 
Department, where he worked his way up through the ranks to become captain 
and served as commander of the Glynn/Brunswick Narcotics Enforcement Team. 
He was recently honored with a retirement celebration by colleagues and 
area law enforcement officials. Starling began his 31-year career 
patrolling a beat in the county's toughest neighborhood. As a narcotics 
investigator and supervisor, he has worked some big drug cases.

Those cases included the seizure of 21 tons of marijuana smuggled in on a 
shrimp boat and the arrest of drug traffickers flying planeloads of pot 
from Key West to Vermont. ''In my career, we've seized five shrimp boats, 
three sailboats, two airplanes and a lot of dope,'' Starling said. Police 
Chief Matt Doering has worked with Starling for about 20 years. ''He rises 
to that pinnacle where we're never really going to be able to replace 
him,'' Doering said. Starling cut his teeth on some of the county's biggest 
cases. In the mid-1970s, he and then-chief Carl Alexander became suspicious 
of two men hauling a sport-fishing boat registered in the Grand Bahamas up 
to St. Simons Island. Starling and Alexander followed the men around the 
clock for five days before the men met up with several other people who 
then led them to a secluded stretch of beach on the northern side of the 
island. ''It was just pure gut instinct that something wasn't right with 
those guys,'' Starling recalled. Their suspicions were confirmed when they 
learned one of the men was acquainted with a suspected drug smuggler. 
Starling and Alexander teamed up with agents from the Georgia Bureau of 
Investigation, U.S. Customs Service, U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration 
and Camden County Sheriff's Office to keep the group under surveillance. At 
about 3 a.m. one night, the investigators, concealed in nearby woods, saw 
that they had spent several hours waiting for: the men unloading bales of 
marijuana from a shrimp boat at a private dock. ''By then, we'd gotten smart.

We waited for them to unload the boat before we arrested them. That way we 
didn't have to do all that heavy work, too,'' Starling said. They got 21 
tons of marijuana and arrested 13 people. In another major case, the 
investigators intercepted a private plane carrying 7,000 pounds of 
marijuana when the pilot landed to refuel on St. Simons Island. An airport 
worker tipped them off to the shipment. Starling said the seizure and 
related investigation led to a drug kingpin with a smuggling operation 
along the eastern seaboard. After testifying against him during a trial in 
Burlington, Vt., Starling received what he considers one of his highest 
compliments. ''The defense attorney came up to me and said he didn't 
believe 'a bunch of country hicks' like us could put together as good a 
case as we did.'' Because smugglers often had better equipment, Starling 
said the investigators had to be twice as sneaky to catch them. He and 
Alexander once eased into the surf and swam up to catch drug dealers in the 
middle of a transaction on Jekyll Island. ''Me and Carl, we thought we 
could catch every bad guy back then,'' Starling said. ''At one time, we 
moved Army cots into the old drug squad office and slept there because we 
were afraid we'd miss a phone call with a tip about a drug deal.'' Because 
he was single, Starling said, it was easier for him to work undercover. He 
spent several Christmas holidays on the job - sending others home to be 
with their families. ''Working narcotics is hard on a marriage and 
family,'' he said. ''You might be gone two or three days and not be able to 
tell your wife where you are or what's happening.'' It was lonely work 
sometimes. ''But we stayed busy, and we all were like a family.'' Starling 
said he always emphasized a simple rule for officers under his command. 
''We try to teach the new people that if a guy deals dope today, he'll deal 
dope tomorrow, too, so you build your case until you have enough 
evidence.'' Uncertain if he's really ready to retire, Starling is 
considering a second career in sort of the same type of work, as a hunting 
and fishing guide.
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