Updated 7:25 p.m. Arrested named, charges, drugs found. Details at the end of the report.
ST. GEORGE — The sight of men hanging off the side of a vehicle is unusual enough. When it’s an armored vehicle and it says “SWAT” on it, it’s even more unusual. The St. George Police Department in conjunction with the Washington County Drug Task Force executed a search warrant Tuesday afternoon at 374 Vermillion Avenue.
Police units and the SWAT team assembled in a staging area just before noon before taking off to serve the warrant.
“The Washington County Drug Task Force has some information about a possible drug source in the community,” Washington County Drug Task Force Sgt. Jordan Minnick said. “We obtained enough information that today we executed a search warrant on a residence here on Vermillion Avenue.”
Minnick said the type of drugs seized were unknown at this time.
“There is items relating to drugs and drug distribution in plain view within the house, but how much, what’s all there, I don’t know yet.”
The residents of the house were well known to officers, Minnick said.
“There are individuals who this is not their first chance to reform themselves, if you will. It’s not their first rodeo, it’s also not their first search warrant either.”
Resident Greg Crawford said he heard two explosions about 10 seconds apart from each other.
“I was up on the hill over there,” Crawford said. “I didn’t see them (SGPD) come up, but I heard the bangs from over there on the hill.”
Noise-distraction devices were used at the residence.
The task force has a “matrix,” Minnick said, that is used to determine how large the force should be.
“We look at every aspect of who the individuals might be in the residence, what their criminal history might entail, how many people might be in the residence,” Minnick said.
The result that returns from those variables determines the amount of resources, including SWAT, that is used.
Minnick said the neighborhood was pleased to have the drugs out of the area.
“I know that the people around here, there’s no way they couldn’t have noticed what was going on. So starting right here, I’m sure that these folks if you were to speak with them would probably be superbly happy.”
UPDATE 7:25 p.m. The following persons were arrested by task force members. All were charged with possession of illegal drugs, among which were suspected meth, heroin and marijuana, and paraphernalia. Other charges will be listed with the individual’s name:
Jeremy Allen Wright of St. George. Also charged with witness tampering and child endangerment.
Monique Salas of St. George. Also charged with child endangerment.
Andrew Guerrero of St. George. Also charged with reckless endangerment.
Freda Blake of St. George. Also charged with child endangerment.
Dustin Adair of St. George. Also charged with child endangerment.
Anthony Feagin of St. George. Also charged with possession of a weapon by a dangerous person, child endangerment, and possession of drugs with intent to distrubute.
This report is based on preliminary information provided by law enforcement or other emergency responders and may not contain the full scope of findings.
Persons arrested or charged are presumed innocent until found guilty in a court of law or as otherwise decided by a trier-of-fact.
Email: [email protected]
Twitter: @STGnews | @NewsWayman
Copyright St. George News, SaintGeorgeUtah.com LLC, 2017, all rights reserved.
So “some information” of a “possible drug source” is enough to justify using flash grenades when there is a history of things going bad with them (http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/headlines/2014/05/baby-in-coma-after-police-grenade-dropped-in-crib-during-drug-raid/), including SWAT going to the wrong house (http://abcnews.go.com/US/story?id=95475, http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/chicago-woman-82-hospital-police-raid-article-1.2570368, etc, etc) and holding innocent women and children at gun point?
Please send the MRAP back to the feds with a “thanks but no thanks, we changed our minds”. I’m all for fighting crime, including drug dealing, but unless you know exactly who is in that house, that no innocent kids are present, and you know they’re sitting around with guns on their laps waiting to shoot you, I think breaking windows and chucking in flash grenades is overreach.
That SWAT vehicle looks like just the ticket for the Boy Scouts in my ward to use for putting up flags. You could hang 15 or 20 boys on the outside of that beast and have them flags in their holes pronto!
I’m glad to see them sweep them out. However I have an adult mentally disabled son who is on probation and an addict it’s very hard to deal with especially when he doesn’t take his seizure medicine or doesn’t go to his Dr appointments. He goes missing for days. He’s got the mind of a defiant child even his probation officer said there’s nothing they can do. It’s like watching your kid drown in front of you.
Gotta create and control the chaos in order to mentaly condition the ill informed pea brained resident that the war on drugs is nothing but a for profit business controled by agencies of gubment. Using the suckers with addictive personalities one can puchase illegal drugs in any city in this country. It’s planned to create this drug epidemic so city’s can convince the asleep taxpayer to allow outrageously high budgets to purchase unnecessary “toys” to “stop crime” Those arrested and previously on the LEO radar were forced to be rehabilitated in a way men with guns wanted them to be rehabilitated. They are never cured just caged long enough to want drugs more. When it was time to release the still addicted “criminal” they allow the “criminal” to get back to business then bring in all the toys and fear tactics to punish the addicted “criminal” again. This justifies the budget to stop crime.
In all honesty…I think you all are on something haha. .If it weren’t for these busts we would have serious drug addicted homes on every street (we actually might already). I personally have lived in a home were I had no clue all my roommates were drug addicts until the swat came in, so excuse me, but I would NOT want my children around that, thanks! Drug addicts are the scarest people capable of anything! They don’t care about themselves they sure are not going to care about you, your kids, or your possessions.
I’m with you Rob83. I for one do not want to be a victim, and drug addicts will victimize whoever is convenient. Their family and acquaintances are usually first on the list. Let the PD use their big boy toys to gather ’em up and get them off our streets. Living in a neighborhood with a drug house is like living in gang territory – everyone is at risk.
Agree w/ both comments here. We had a drug house in my neighborhood a while back (couple years maybe). Of course it was a rental, and there were lots of people living there, constantly coming and going. The cops won’t do anything unless you can report a crime in progress. I’m sure the place was already on the cops’ radar. I confronted several of these residents because I knew they were dealing and I wasn’t just gonna sit by. Eventually they got so scared of me they stopped bringing drug traffic into the area, and finally they moved (they probably got evicted). I didn’t threaten them in any way, but they could tell I wasn’t just gonna sit by idly and let them get away with what they were doing. Drug dealers thrive when people around refuse to do anything. You can’t always just expect cops to take care of it, because sometimes they flat out won’t. With the amount of drug issues in this county they don’t even have the resources to keep an eye on most drug houses. If you got a drug house in your area, you make it clear to the scum that they aint welcome. You find every possible way to shut them down. Had the scum I confronted decided to retaliate on me some way they’d have had a little war on their hands. I think they knew this was something they couldn’t win. I’m a very very nice person but druggy scum is something I won’t tolerate around me.
Spoken like a true coward that is happy to trade away all of his or her civil liberties for a little extra security in this big, scary world. You’d be singing a different tune if the police had gotten the address wrong and raided your house by mistake, shot your dog and put your kids in the hospital.
BLM protestor/supporter?
I’m a lot more concerned about a violent gang of mercenaries conducting military raids on private residences in town than I am about people selling drugs. What little respect I had left for local law enforcement is gone.
spoken like a true doper/addict. You have obviously never been a victim of drugged-up, methed-up scum. It’s a real problem.
I don’t already have opinions about people based solely on the group they’re part of. That’s called prejudice. I judge people and organizations based on their actions. I protest against anyone that uses violence to achieve their objectives. I support anyone that does not. I’ll give you an example. I’m not anti-police. I support the Salt Lake City Police Department because they are actively working to de-escalate violent situations with great success. I do not currently support the St George Police Department because they are becoming increasingly militarized and violent. If they decide to follow the SLCPD’s example, they can regain my support.
Well Neil I agree. They think they need to play commando GI Joe and act like a bunch of paramilitary tough guys. And why didn’t they clean up this drug house before it came to them using military invasion tactics, who knows. They’re probably just another part of gov’t that is power hungry and out of control. I guess it’s a lot funner for them to play GI Joe than to do traffic patrols. All that said I’m glad they at least cleaned up 1 drug house and I wish they’d clean up a lot more. Whether or not they need full paramilitary gear to do it, who knows. In most cases they’re just loser junkies who’ll go in without a fight, but then the cops need to be somewhat prepared as you can buy an AR15 as easily as buying a fishing license.