Springfield Township Police had an interesting encounter Monday after a pet raccoon named Chewy was found with a meth pipe during a traffic stop.
Around 7:15 p.m., a Springfield officer conducted a traffic stop on South Arlington Road because the registered owner of the vehicle had a suspended license, police said.
When Officer Austin Branham asked the woman to step out of her car, the woman said she could not because there was a raccoon at her feet.
“At first, obviously I thought maybe that was some kind of joke, and I look down and sure enough Chewy was sitting at her feet, looking up at me,” Branham said during a press conference on Wednesday.
The woman was detained without incident, but that's when things took even more of a turn.
The officer returned to the vehicle and found Chewy sitting in the driver's seat with a meth pipe in his mouth, police said.
“I noticed the raccoon, Chewy, popped his head up, and when I turned to look inside the vehicle to make sure he didn't hop out, that's when I noticed he was holding a glass methamphetamine pipe,” Branham said.
Branham grabbed the pipe from Chewy, but when he turned back around to the raccoon, Chewy was holding yet another meth pipe.
After discovering Chewy's strange recreational activities, Branham and officer Ty Klapp searched the vehicle further and found a 7.15 grams of methamphetamine, .10 grams of crack cocaine and three used glass meth pipes, police said.
The driver was charged with possession of drugs, three counts of possession of drug paraphernalia, and was cited for driving under suspension, police said.
She was also turned over to Cuyahoga Falls Police on her active warrant. Additional charges related to crack cocaine possession will be presented at a grand jury pending Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigation lab results, police said.
Chewy was unharmed and was returned to the woman's family. Springfield Police and the Ohio Department of Natural Resources will be checking on Chewy to ensure he has the proper documentation to be a household pet.
