Featured player in this week’s “What Were They Thinking: Criminal Edition” is a 26-year old Saugus resident who must not have seen the patrol car parked nearby while he made a sale of a controlled substance.

Let alone that a sheriff’s Sergeant might be sitting there watching the whole thing go down.

About 2:15 p.m. Wednesday, Sgt. Dan Peacock of the Santa Clarita Valley station was parked in the lot of Bouquet Center at Bouquet Canyon and Newhall Ranch Roads when he observed “what appeared to be a hand-to-hand drug transaction.”

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“After the vehicle left the parking lot, I followed and made a traffic stop and asked him about what I saw,” said Peacock. “There were two occupants in the vehicle and the driver told me I didn’t see what I thought.”

The strong smell of marijuana gave Peacock reason to search the car, where he found a large quantity of marijuana and a significant amount of money, along with a set of scales in a backpack that belonged to the driver.

The driver, a 26-year-old male Hispanic who lives in Saugus, was arrested on suspicion of possession of controlled substances for sale and remains in custody at the Santa Clarita Valley station.

His passenger, a male Caucasian of the same age, was not held.