Pubdate: Tue, 27 Jun 2017
Source: New York Post (NY)
Copyright: 2017 N.Y.P. Holdings, Inc.
Contact: http://www.nypost.com/postopinion/letters/letters_editor.htm
Website: http://www.nypost.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/296

HANDYMAN JAILED FOR MONTHS AFTER COPS MISTAKE DRYWALL FOR COCAINE

It was a miscarriage of dust-ice.

A handyman spent three months behind bars after cops believed they'd
found cocaine sprinkled around his car -- until test results later
proved it was clean, according to reports.

Karlos Cash, 57, says the white powder was actually drywall -- just as
he'd been telling them all along.

"I know for a fact (that) it's drywall because I'm a handyman," he
told WFTV Orlando. "I said that continuously during the arrest stop."

Florida police spotted the suspicious substance when they pulled Cashe
over on March 22 for a busted headlight, the news site reports.

Cashe was already on probation for weed and coke charges from 2015,
and cops say a field test at the scene came up positive for cocaine,
while a drug-sniffing dog went wild for his car.

"It looks like he had a gram and he crushed it up when he saw you,"
one officer says to another in the video of the arrest, according to
News 6.

He was denied bond because of his probation, and sat in a cell for 90
days until results on the powder came back from a laboratory: negative
for all drugs.

Cashe, who is black, believes he was racially profiled and is now
seeking compensation for the work he missed.

"I was profiled. It wasn't the first time, it just was just the worst
of those times," he told News 6.
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