A Calgary woman whose car was stolen thought her luck had changed when police called to say it was found and would be returned.

Now, she’s wondering how they could have missed the cocaine and knife in the front seat, and the crack pipe sitting in plain view in the back.

Courtney Pickering’s 2014 Dodge Dart was stolen last week, from the alleyway behind her home. To make matters worse, her purse was inside, allowing the thief or thieves to drain her bank account by using the tap function on her bank card.

A couple of days later, police called Pickering to say the vehicle had been found, and she could collect it after forensics finished going over it.

As soon as she opened her car at the impound lot, she found a knife in the front passenger door, a lead pipe and garbage on the floor mats, and four stolen ID’s in the glove box.

In the car’s cup holder, she found a small bag of cocaine.

“And I went to the impound guy, ‘Is this normal? Like, what do I do with this?’ He was like ‘Just throw it on the ground, throw it on the ground!” she told CTV Calgary.

When she looked in the back, she found a crack pipe on the seat.

“A crack pipe on the seat where my son's car seat is usually on, right there, out in the open. So I grabbed that and threw it out of my car and I just lost my mind a little bit, like what is going on? I don't understand,” she recounted.

Pickering took a cellphone video of what she found, and then left her car for police to check again and remove the evidence. The vehicle was then towed to a repair shop where Pickering searched her car again.

That’s when she noticed the butt of a gun under the seat.

“At this point, I can't tell if it's real or fake, but all I know is my hands have been on too many illegal things in the past 24 hours and I didn't want anymore,” she said.

The gun turned out to be a pellet gun, but Pickering is still angry. She has now filed a complaint with the Professional Standards Section of the Calgary Police. She says she hopes the complaint will prevent similar situations from occurring again.

“I'm trying to make enough noise so that hopefully maybe it'll affect that one officer or even anyone in their day-to-day operations,” she said.

The Calgary Police Service tells CTV News that a stolen vehicle’s interior is not always checked; it depends on the situation, but they admit it’s unusual to have drugs and weapons left inside.

Police officials say an investigation has been launched into Pickering's complaint. They are also investigating the vehicle theft, going over the security video at the stores where her bank card was used. No arrests have yet been made.

As for Pickering, she is still driving a rental car while her own car gets a thorough cleaning.

With a report from CTV Calgary’s Shaun Frenette