Satirical shirt no laughing matter for some cops
By George P. Hassett

   In addition to being overzealous Spring cleaners, Somerville police are showing they also have a sense of humor.
   This week a t-shirt lampooning the $31,535 of seized drug money accidentally thrown away, made its rounds in local law enforcement circles.
   The t-shirt features a graphic of a pile of $20 bills underneath a sign reading, ‚ÄúLOST: $31,000 Please Return to Somerville Police ASAP.‚Äù

    The story of the discarded metal desk containing $31,535 has been picked up by media outlets from Houston to Texas, including the television station MSNBC, an affiliate of NBC.
    Two officers assigned to cleanup an overstuffed evidence room found the desk leaning on its side May 8 and assumed it belonged in a dumpster with other office furniture being discarded. The evidence clerk who was using the drawer unit was not working that day, said Acting Police Chief Robert R. Bradley.
    When the clerk came in the next day, the two officers who had cleaned out the room excitedly showed her what they had done. That‚Äôs when police realized a mistake had been made.
    ‚ÄúA very bad mistake,‚Äù said Bradley in a statement.
     That day police officials tracked the dumpster to a Waste Management Industries transfer station on McGrath Highway. They were told the trash and the drawer unit had been loaded on a 40-foot garbage trailer and hauled to a landfill in Rochester, N.H.
    Once at the landfill, police made a grim discovery.
    ‚ÄúThey thought they‚Äôd be able to pick through the trash and, get their hands dirty, but still find it.  But those landfills are pushed down with such heavy machinery trying to go through it would be like trying to dig into McGrath Highway with a shovel,‚Äù said Patrolmen‚Äôs Union President Jack Leutcher.  ‚ÄúSomeday, some archaeologist studying our civilization may come upon all that cash, but until then I think we‚Äôre out of luck.‚Äù
     Now, a t-shirt parodying the mishap has appeared in the city, and police officials are not amused.
     ‚ÄúI don‚Äôt think it‚Äôs funny at all,‚Äù said Lieutenant Paul Upton. ‚ÄúIt is disheartening some people are trying to make light of a serious situation.‚Äù