I got there and found the package. Sure enough, it did look a little odd. It was a cardboard box about 10" x 6" x 6". It was marked "Anvil", which I recognized as a maker of fasteners used in the construction industry. The road leads to new housing subdivisions, so in that sense it was not out of place.
However, it had been secured closed with black electrical tape wrapped around it both long-ways and cross-ways. Hmmm. I hate these calls because they are always a big nothing -- but I don't want to be the one blown up when it is something. But this area was not a high-risk target area. We do have a couple of international businesses on the other side of town; if this was near there, I may have been more concerned.
In this case, I decided to just satisfy my curiosity and just look inside the box. I cut the electrical tape and opened the flaps. Inside I found paper towels -- the heavy-duty kind that come folded like napkins, only bigger and stronger.
I pushed aside the towels with a twig and found the offensive package. It was not a bomb. (Well, that's debatable.) It was not a chemical weapon. (Well, again, debatable.)
It was a turd.
That's right: a big, fat, brown, corn-laden poo, taped shut in the box with the makeshift shitpaper and discarded on the side of the road.
In twenty years as a cop, I never would have thought I would actually be dispatched to investigate a box of shit. That's what I love about my job -- it's always unpredictable.
It doesn't take the FBI to figure out it was a construction worker who left the package for me to investigate, since it was in a construction area, in a construction-type box, and had the construction-type paper towels and electrical tape. But here's the part only a seasoned police officer (and peculiar crapper) could figure out: the offending crapper was probably Hispanic.
Now, before you think I'm a racist mocking Hispanic hygiene, let me assure you that I am not. Actually, my reasoning is more of a compliment.
The poo had a high content of corn and bits of red pepper. Our friends at the FBI would call that a clue.
More importantly, though, your average American construction worker who had to crap at work would surely have taken the opportunity to saunter to the porta-potty to take a nice long break, have a smoke, and goof off.
A hard-working laborer from Mexico or Guatemala, on the other hand -- the kind who wouldn't stop working for anything -- has to be the man behind this shit story.
I say bravo to him! Although I'd rather next time he not leave his product suspiciously on the side of the road.