Crime Fighting 'Westie' On Pittsfield's Steroids Trail

Fearless pooch with whom one does not mess

by G.M. Heller
Published: Wednesday, March 23, 2011 11:30PM

Great Barrington, Massachusetts -- Murray, the well-known 'Westie' who lives on Hollenbeck Avenue in this southern Berkshire town, apparently gets around more than he lets on, at least to those who think they know him well.
'Little' Murray >
At home in Gt. Barrington
Photo Credit: Yankee Magazine

The hirsute West Highland White Terrier, known on the street and in Vegas as Murray 'Bones' (as in 'he made his') , has been pointing his pointed nose northward, into air miles away from this sleepy neighborhood in South County.

This, along with lots of investigative digging, doggy-style, has enabled the pugnacious pooch to come up with some meaty tidbits about Pittsfield's unfolding anabolic steroids scandal (all the more noteworthy because Murray says his human housemates think he's vegetarian).

Murray also labors under the treacly moniker 'Little' Murray (a name he says he detests), pasted on him by those same housemates. Says Murray, "Sanctimonious Liberals, what the hell do they know.")

Murray's most recent revelations concern the U.S. Postal Inspection Service investigation, the one no one in Pittsfield City Hall wants to speak of, and which few at the Pittsfield Police Department will even admit to knowing about.

Seems that Murray, on account of his diminutive presence, was able unobtrusively to get up close and personal whilst certain events were going down last week in Pittsfield.

As Murray puts it, "Well Pops (Murray apparently calls everyone he likes 'Pops'), it was like this. I'd caught a ride up seven and was sniffing around downtown Pittsfield when I came across what smelled like really rank piss -- ya know, really sour -- like worse than a French cat house at low tide, if you comprendo dog."

It occurred to me I should ask Murray how he came about his knowledge of this more esoteric aspect of France, but decided to let it go til another time. As for the smell, though he may not understand the specific chemical process, Murray was making reference to the airborne emissions anabolic steroids give off when metabolized by the human body and mixed with sweat.

"So I followed this rank smell up North Street, then pawed left onto Summer, ending up in front of this big place that was all lit-up, with people, and big rooms with strange machines inside. The sign way above my head had a word I got, but the other I never heard of: 'Berkshire Nautilus'.
Murray 'Bones' (as in 'he made his')
With tan, deep undercover at Berkshire Nautilus
Photo Credit: Las Vegas Sun

"Next I knew, the place was all in an uproar. Some smelly guy was being handcuffed, others questioned. I figured out pretty quick this was a bust, but over what I could not tell. All I know is that the smelly guy getting cuffed got searched up and down and front to back by some very large and thorough Pops.

"Those doing the searching pulled from Smelly one of those paper piles held together with a spiral wire thingy. From what I could see, there were pages and pages of groups of letters, and numbers beside each of these letter groups.

"From Smelly's pocket one of the Pops pulled out a round chunk of long green papers. Not sure what it was, but that Pops was counting out each green paper in front of Smelly telling him finally how many greens he'd counted. It sounded like a big number, something 'thousand'.

"There were now two Pops looking through the paper piles and they went wide-eyed telling each other 'Hey, can you believe all these f***ing names!', using a word I hear all the time when I'm home, while they pointed to specific groups of letters, shaking their heads.

"One of the Pops said, 'Isn't he that lawyer?' The other responded 'Yeah, and isn't this one a big mucky muck?' saying words I didn't quite understand. These two went back and forth page after page talking about how many groups of letters they were seeing on each page, and something about how next to each letter group Smelly had written a 'date' and an 'amount'.

"They finally called over to a third Pops to join them, that's how excited they were. These three Pops were at once shaking their heads, smirking, even laughing as they paged through all these papers containing what one Pops called 'a goddam road map', another word I hear around the house all the time.

"Then they put the whole pile of paper, carefully it seemed, along with the chunk of green papers into a large yellow paper sleeve. One Pops licked the top, folded it, wrote something on it, and then handed it to one of the other Pops.

"I'll tell ya, Pops, it was just about then that I got scared and the hairs on my back stood straight up. I coulda used a hydrant right there, but I just got the hell away instead.

"As fast as I could, I ran out the door, headed down to Center Street and cut a hard left.

"Then you'll never guess what happened next, Pops. I stopped running when I hit South Church.

"Out of breath I found myself in front of another big building, this one only half lit. No one around. Mercury vapor and compact fluorescent lighting -- really eerie.

"Still backed up from before and even worse now from all that running, I was circling for someplace to go. I found this nice spot on the sidewalk. Ahh, sweet relief!

"Just then two fellas came out the clear doors one a step behind the other and headed smack dab for where I'd just planted that big one. And let me tell ya, it was humongous, a word I got from those jiggly human movies Pops is always watching when we stay upstairs at the Albany place.

"Just as the shorter of the two was saying 'Dammit Conor, I think I left my glasses at Taylor's barn again,' the short guy went and stepped right in the middle of it.

"I don't think he even realized because he just kept on walking. Meantime, the taller guy he called Conor had been walking slightly behind, and well, he just kept coming.

"In the middle of replying, 'Clarence, do you know how to spell horse's ass?', SQUISH!, wouldn't ya know it happened again, that tall fella, well, he too landed in, ... er, in the tall grass, if you get my dog.

"Let me tell ya, Pops, I got the hell out of there too, and as fast as I could git, and caught the first ride I could find back here to South County. I've had about as much Pittsfield humans getting into real shit as I can stand for awhile. Now feed me." <<<<<

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Write to G.M. Heller at editor@berkshirerecord.com

The author wishes to thank Murray's family and entire neighborhood for granting Murray the liberal leash privileges that have so obviously empowered and enabled this brave animal to fight crime, as well as to contribute to this article. We just hope others take to heart the lesson of what empowering animals can really accomplish.