ST. GEORGE – With the Washington County Drug Task Force making multiple arrests recently, it would appear that drug activity is on the rise. While arrests have been on the rise, St. George Police Capt. Kyle Whitehead said task force arrests tend to “ebb and flow.”
There are periods of “feast and famine,” Whitehead said. While there are multiple arrests taking place now, there may soon be a period where there is little news of task force arrests produced as the detectives involved in the task forces engage investigations, surveillance operations, gathering evidence and so forth to build their cases. Once enough evidence is gathered the arrests follow.
In some cases, Whitehead said members of the task force become familiar with certain individuals involved in the drug culture of the area. Should a detective come across one of these people and recognize him or her, they may choose to follow that person to see if any suspicious activity is taking place. If something seems amiss, the detective will move in and investigate to see if anything illegal is taking place.
This is what happened to Adam Wallin, 29, of Washington, and Jacob Wooley, 22, of Ivins, yesterday. Whitehead said task force detectives recognized the two men and observed them acting suspicious in a parking lot in the east part of St. George. Detectives made contact with the two men after they observed “something odd” being put into the back of a pickup truck.
The task force K-9 unit was called in and after sniffing around the truck indicated that possible narcotics were in the truck bed. Upon closer inspection the detectives discovered what Whitehead described as heroin and heroin-related drug paraphernalia.
Both men were arrested and booked into jail, both were charged with two third-degree felony offenses for possession of heroin and one class B misdemeanor count of drug paraphernalia.
A third individual, Jeremy Syddall, 31, of St. George, was also arrested yesterday in an unrelated incident for drug distribution. Whitehead said a confidential informant allegedly obtained meth from Syddall during a controlled buy in June.
Syddall was arrested and currently faces a second-degree felony charge for drug manufacture/distribution.
Note: Persons arrested or charged are presumed innocent until found guilty in a court of law or as otherwise decided by a trier-of-fact.
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Good job STGPD. Get this crap off the streets. Like it or not, it’s here. And heroin DESTROYS. You might not think that it affects you, but these people NEED money for their habit. And it just might be you one day paying for it, via scam, burglary, or even just getting robbed in a gas station.