Sarasota County Defendants Face Drug Trafficking Charges After Drug Bust At Home

All over Central Florida, people have illegal drugs in their houses; police do not know where these drugs are and in what quantities, and they have little way of finding out.  This is because the Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution prohibits unlawful search and seizure of private property.  Many arrests for drug possession arise from traffic stops, because items in the car or actions by its occupants give the officer conducting the traffic stop probable cause to search the vehicle.  The police might even find a big enough quantity of drugs to charge the driver with possession with intent to deliver.  If the police want to search a residence for a large stash of drugs, they must first obtain a search warrant.  To do this, they must present evidence to the judge to support their belief that they will find illegal drugs if they search the residence.  If you are facing criminal charges after police found illegal drugs during a search of your residence, contact a Tampa drug crime lawyer.

Search Warrant Yields Discovery of Methamphetamine, Fentanyl, and Prescription Pills

By the beginning of 2023, police in North Port, Florida had begun to suspect that a certain house on Bullard Street was the site of drug trafficking activity.  One weekend in January, they executed a search warrant at the residence.  During a search of the house, they found a large stash of controlled substances, including 62 grams of fentanyl, three pounds of methamphetamine, and an undisclosed quantity of prescription pills.  The WFLA news website did not specify what kind of prescription drugs they were.  The fentanyl alone is enough to kill hundreds of people.

During the search, police arrested John Porter, 37, and Kaila Wieland, 29, both of whom are residents of the house where the search took place.  Porter is facing charges for drug possession, possession of drug manufacturing equipment, drug manufacturing, and drug trafficking.  Wieland is also facing all of the above charges, in addition to resisting an officer and violating probation.

Like all defendants in criminal cases, Porter and Wieland are presumed innocent until proven guilty, and they have the right to take their cases to trial.  They could both face long prison sentences if convicted on all counts.  Most defendants whose criminal cases reach the stage of being formally charged plead guilty, sometimes after initially entering a plea of not guilty but before the case goes to trial.  Defendants who plead guilty usually receive lighter sentences than those convicted at trial, especially if they provide information that assists police in ongoing investigations.  Such information is often especially desirable in drug trafficking cases, as these tend to involve multiple defendants, and defendants who provide information could get their charges reduced or even receive immunity from prosecution.

Contact Tampa Criminal Defense Attorney Bryant Scriven

A criminal defense lawyer can help you if you are facing charges for drug trafficking or manufacture of controlled substances.  Contact Scriven Law in Tampa, Florida to schedule a consultation.

Source:

wfla.com/news/2-charged-after-large-amounts-of-the-most-dangerous-drugs-found-inside-florida-home/