Two officers behind a lengthy undercover investigation leading to the arrest of more than a dozen people accused of dealing drugs were honored for their work during an award ceremony last week in Jackson.

Vicksburg narcotics investigators Jeff Merritt and Dewayne Smith both received the Top Cop award for Vicksburg Police Department at the law enforcement officers’ memorial day ceremony.

“It’s like a cat and mouse game. When the bad guys are in jail, we’ve won,” Smith said.

That cat and mouse game led to 18 arrests earlier this year in Operation Long Time Coming, which took down suspects accused of being mid- to high-level drug dealers.

“A lot of people think it’s all make an undercover buy and get an arrest warrant and that’s it,” Merritt said. “It takes hours of surveillance, multiple buys and a lot of work.”

Because of Merritt and Smith’s hard work in Operation Long Time Coming, when it came time to nominate a single officer for the annual Top Cop award, Police Chief Walter Armstrong asked if he could submit both Smith and Merritt.

“I couldn’t honor one and not the other,” Armstrong said. “It’s hard to separate the two.”

Merritt has been in law enforcement for 22 years, 15 of which he has been assigned to the VPD narcotic unit. It’s a job he feels he was destined to do. His father and uncles were both sheriffs’ deputies in Louisiana.

“You can’t do this job without everyone else. It’s a team effort, Merritt said.

“We have to have the involvement of everyone at the police department and the citizens.”

Smith has been with Vicksburg Police Department for 16 years and has worked in narcotics investigation for 12. He also followed in his family’s footsteps. His mother, Dora, is a retired VPD lieutenant, and his brother Wayne is a trooper with the Mississippi Highway Safety Patrol.

“I want to give many things to my family and our supervisors who allow us to adjust our schedule so we can complete our investigations,” Smith said.

Tracking drug dealers certainly isn’t a 9 to 5 job and can require working odd hours at any time of day.

“You miss holidays, birthdays, ect. Without the support of your family, it makes this job harder,” Merritt said.

Crack cocaine and methamphetamine are the major drugs being trafficked in Vicksburg, both investigators said. Crack and meth were also top drugs suspects in Operation Long Time Coming were accused of pushing.

“We know it’s a never-ending fight,” Merritt said. “But you know you’re doing your job to try to keep it off the streets.”

Still there are rarely any hard feelings between captured drug dealers and narcotics agents, Smith said.

During drug raids, Smith is perhaps the most recognizable officer because for the past 10 years he has worn a red t-shirt displaying the message “Can’t sell dope forever.”

“I started wearing it on drug raids. I wanted to deliver a true message and let them know that you can’t sell dope forever,” Smith said.

The message taken from the lyric of a rap song by the same name has become somewhat of an unofficial slogan for the narcotics unit.

“We’ve all ordered one,” Merritt said.