Rats Have Munchies for Marijuana in Houston Police Evidence Room Because of Years-Long Backlog

A backlogged police evidence room in Houston, Texas, is a bountiful buffet for the city’s rats, who have been munching on loads of seized marijuana and magic mushrooms.

Houston officials said they will start destroying the drugs that are no longer needed for cases. Some of the substances have been locked away for decades at the downtown headquarters of the Houston Police Department.

“We’ve got 400,000 lbs. of marijuana in storage,” Houston Mayor John Whitmire said at a press conference last week. “The rats are the only ones enjoying it.”

Rats have also gotten into “packaging containing magic mushrooms,” Harris County District Attorney general counsel Joshua Reiss told KHOU 11.

The rat stash is a symptom of a larger problem with the severely backlogged Houston police evidence room, officials say, owing to policies forbidding police from disposing of evidence.

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Critics say maintaining the evidence room keeps cops busy and away from the street, while causing inefficiencies in the disposition of cases.

Now, police will be able to destroy any narcotic evidence obtained prior to 2015, Harris County DA Sean Teare said at the press conference. Further, police will be able to destroy evidence upon the execution of a plea bargain if both prosecutors and the defense agree to it.

The DA’s office says it will notify defendants in 3,600 cases that evidence may have been compromised by rodents, though only one case is believed to have been jeopardized by the animals, KHOU 11 reports.