Stoner rats found eating up marijuana in New Orleans police evidence room: ‘They’re all high!’

These rats have got friends in high places.

Reefer-loving rodents are gobbling up the cannabis stash held under lock and key in the New Orleans Police Department’s dilapidated evidence room, officials announced on Monday.

“The rats are eating our marijuana,” Superintendent Anne Kirkpatrick told the City Council’s Criminal Justice Committee, according to NOLA.com.

“They’re all high.”

Kirkpatrick’s startling report came as she pleaded with city councilors to fund a new home for the Big Easy’s police force.

She argued that the current police headquarters, built in 1968, are not fit for a modern force — describing how the elevators are broken, there is no air conditioning, and officers are forced to work around the rat and cockroach droppings scattered on their desks.

The stoned rats are of particular concern because their taste for marijuana could jeopardize criminal cases, she noted.

“The uncleanliness is off the charts,” Kirkpatrick told city officials on Monday.

“The janitorial cleaning [team] deserves an award, trying to clean what is uncleanable.”

Problems at the police headquarters seemed to have arisen in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina devastating the city in 2005.

“The basement was full [of flooding water],” an unidentified veteran of the force told NOLA.com.

“You get a lot of rodents that climb through the walls. Some things you can’t get to, so there has always been some type of rodent — bugs, rats, mice, whatever,” the officer explained.

The infestation is now a “turn-off” for any potential out-of-state transfers and hinders morale among the police force, Kirkpatrick argued.

“It’s not OK, and it’s not OK for people to be treated that way and be called ‘valued,’” she said.

Councilmember Oliver Thomas, who chairs the Criminal Justice Committee, seemed to agree.

He said he was “surprised” by the news of the marijuana-eating rats.

“Everything is a surprise,” he told NOLA.com.

“It was a surprise that headquarters was going to move when we heard about it in the news. It shouldn’t be a surprise that we are surprised.”

Thomas and other council members ultimately moved on Monday to approve the police department’s 10-year lease of two floors of a downtown office building — pending a full council vote.

Under the terms of the lease agreement, the city would pay a total base rent of $7.6 million from its general fund over 10 years.

But trying to fix all the problems the current headquarters are facing — including trying to exterminate the stoner rats — would cost three times as much, according to Chief Administrative Officer Gilbert Montaño.

Police officials now hope to move into the high rise by May 1, according to WWLTV.