Cash and processed marijuana buds are seized from Kelso home / Courtesy photo by Centralia Police Department’
By Sharyn L. Decker
Lewis County Sirens news reporter
A two-month investigation by the Centralia Police Department’s special Anti-Crime Team led yesterday to the seizure of 21 pounds of dried marijuana buds, guns, cars, more than $50,000 cash and nine-foot tall marijuana plants growing in a Kelso backyard.
Centralia police say the suspects were illegally supplying large amounts of marijuana in the Lewis, Thurston, Pierce and Cowlitz county areas, as medical marijuana distributors.
“The suspects were then laundering the money by buying and selling used cars to hide the large amounts of cash,” Centralia Police Department Officer Patty Finch states in a news release.
Police say officers conducted an unspecified number of undercover purchases from the suspects and then yesterday made a traffic stop and arrested George Szerency, 62, of Kelso.
A search that followed of his nearby home on the 800 block of South Seventh Avenue turned up 10 fully mature plants growing in his yard, a handgun, a rifle, just under $51,000 in U.S. currency and the buds plus 24 grams of hash oil. Also seized were a 2004 Pontiac Bonneville and a 1997 Mercedes E320, according to police.
Centralia police were assisted by the Kelso Police Department and the Cowlitz County Drug Task Force.
Szerency was booked into the Cowlitz County Jail for unlawful delivery of marijuana, conspiracy to deliver 15 to 20 pounds of marijuana, unlawful possession of a controlled substance with intent to deliver and unlawful manufacturing of marijuana, all within 1,000 feet of a school zone and while armed, according to the news release.
Officers are referring to prosecutors a case for charging Teresa Torres, 60, also of Kelso, with the same offenses. A case involving a third person, Dennis McCracken, 43, of Kelso, is also being referred to prosecutors for consideration of the charges of unlawful possession of marijuana and unlawful possession of a controlled substance with intent to deliver, according to police.
Police estimate the street value of the seized marijuana at $84,000.
Ten mature marijuana plants grow in a Kelso backyard. / Courtesy photo by Centralia Police Department
Tags: By Sharyn L. Decker, news reporter
Back in the 60’s and 70’s there was a unified drug taskforce that operated state wide with assistance from the State Patrol. They were made up of “donated” officers from different organizations from all over the state.
Officers from Thurston County and even little (back then) Yelm were doing heroin buys in Ephrata which at the time had a distribution hub; off the radar, but centrally located for moving dope where needed accross three states and BC.
I don’t know if our local drug task force works that way or not. I think it’s safe to assume each of our small departments share personal when needed rather than hand everything over to another agency and hope for the best.
On the scanner, I hear the State Patrol, Game dept., Winlock, Toledo, Napavine, Centralia, Chehalis and Morton assisting Lewis County when needed and vise versa over a wide range of calls from assaults in progress to just prisoner transports. That seems to make more sense than treating each area as hard boundaries that can’t be broken.
On the surface, based on the article, this case does raise some quandaries. If the individuals were not legally licensed medical suppliers, why would they have illegal propagation occurring outside at there residence? The volume they’re alleged to supply would suggest an indoor facility. Those outdoor plants are ten foot waving red flags. ” Here I am. Come and get me.”
Equally curious – they’re alleged to have been illegally supplying dispensaries in Lewis, Cowlitz, Thurston and Pierce COUNTIES.
So I ask myself, how did this become a criminal investigation of the municipal Centralia police department?
Could the answer to that question be some metaphorical egg being wiped off some ones face? We’ll have to wait and see.
Whoa dudes. Why all the fighting about legalizing weed. Just take your welfare check and go buy some dope so you can all mello out man.
You mean the law as it’s written today? Or three months ago? Or three years ago? Because, these people who write the law have changed it so many times it’s impossible to keep up and it’s funny that every time they change it, it favors law enforcement and big government so they can keep the status quo and keep seizing and auctioning off the private property of citizens and keep the slave labor flooding into the prison industry. The war on drugs is a lie used to take freedom from the people. If it wasn’t a lie they would have burned all the poppy fields they found in afganistan, but they didn’t. When I was a kid the only heroin junkies I saw were on tv in cop shows that were based in NY or Chicago. Now they are everywhere. Here is some logic for you. U r a buttwipe
sicofit says:
Friday, September 19, 2014 at 9:30 am
Free air. U r probably a cop or ex cop, been reading your posts for a while now, and u always side with them, even the bad ones.
Nope.
The bad ones that get a DUI, excessive use of force, abuse of power, etc. are nothing I’ll defend the actions of. I am in favor of treating each with the same standards that apply to every citizen. Rather than pretending that cops are perfect and will never have a bad day, judge them by the same standards you and I are subject to; not destroyed for something that would only be a ticket for you and I.
The tenth amendment is clear. It’s pretty pathetic that you come on here all the time and the only one who always agrees with you is republican logger and he probably always will, at least untill they start writing laws that restrict his gun rights. Lewis county is a joke and once the trees are gone and the wells out by pe ell are dryed up, the jobs will go and so will the young people.
Not sure how the 10th applies to over logging and drought, but I do understand it in context of State Law.
“Each state retains its sovereignty, freedom, and independence, and every power, jurisdiction, and right, which is not by this Confederation expressly delegated to the United States, in Congress assembled.”
The laws these people were arrested under were not federal, but a violation of the new marijuana state law. Simple as that. State law sets up a very specific route for recreational and medical marijuana to be sold through, not bootlegged. That’s what the Citizens passed, not Congress.
If any place needs to abide by the 5th amendment and have a grand jury it’s lewis county because they have an unconstitutional rolling moritorium on a law that was passed over 15 years ago and they love their republican ideology more than the constitution, this renders the charges against citizens for marijuana, infamous.
Nope.
The Marijuana law is being enforced as written. If not, then those arrested can sue for wrongful arrest and own the day.
Stay Tuned.
They are treasonous bastards and so is ANY and ALL elected or appointed officials who refuse to consent to the WILL OF THE GOVERNED. Dillhole. Lol
Well, there’s logic I guess I can’t argue with.
Free air. U r probably a cop or ex cop, been reading your posts for a while now, and u always side with them, even the bad ones. The tenth amendment is clear. It’s pretty pathetic that you come on here all the time and the only one who always agrees with you is republican logger and he probably always will, at least untill they start writing laws that restrict his gun rights. Lewis county is a joke and once the trees are gone and the wells out by pe ell are dryed up, the jobs will go and so will the young people. If any place needs to abide by the 5th amendment and have a grand jury it’s lewis county because they have an unconstitutional rolling moritorium on a law that was passed over 15 years ago and they love their republican ideology more than the constitution, this renders the charges against citizens for marijuana, infamous. They are treasonous bastards and so is ANY and ALL elected or appointed officials who refuse to consent to the WILL OF THE GOVERNED. Dillhole. Lol
Let it go. The voters made a choice for the State to sell pot. Not old dudes making a bunch of cash. The voters agreed to allow medicinal marijuana which entails growing 15 plants and possessing 24 ounces of medicine. Not selling to everyone, growing 10 plants (trees) that can yield 4-6 pounds each. And Kelso’s newspaper says that he sold to a cop. Come on Darwin believers, here’s your new leader.
“Until, then everyone needs to abide by the laws as passed.”
Just like in Nazi Germany! When the law makes it illegal to medicate yourself, it is our DUTY to get sick and die.
MURICA!!
The cops are enforcing the laws, EXACTLY AS PASSED by the people of this sorry State.
This is 100% on the backs of those who passed the law without reading what the heck they were voting on. Folks who thought they were voting on across the board legalization of pot were either too high or too lazy to read what they were voting on.
Don’t like the law? Wright your own and put it out there. Until, then everyone needs to abide by the laws as passed.
So much for the tenth amendment that law enforcement took an OATH to uphold and defend, treasonous bastards. Of the government, for the govrnment and by the government. Welcome to the land of the free.
That legalization law was so poorly written. Instead of keeping the growing and selling of marijuana illegal except for licensed businesses it should have just made it legal across the board.
I agree that law enforcement resources could be better spent on heroine/meth and child molesters.
Weed is legal Dominoe but the law, the way it was written by the people who wanted to legalize marijuana make sit illegal to grow or sell on your own. Has to be licensed business.
I just want to know when the policy of totally ignoring jurisdictions became the status quo. We have Centralia cops riding rough shod down in Kelso (and Winlock a year or so ago). Then there is Thurston County poking around down here delivering their intense version of “fast moving” (lol) street justice (illegally as it turns out).
I guess there was some heavy duty gerrymandering that I didn’t know about that must’ve taken place. If it is going to be like this why not just do away with city limits, county lines, and state borders altogether? Also, why not do away with elections because it clearly doesn’t seem to matter to law enforcement around here that the public properly went through the channels and DECIDED that pot should be LEGAL. The issue of whether it comes from a “licensed distributor” or an “independent drug dealer” really wasn’t the issue when people made their decision last November. Making it legal to possess, use, and sell was the goal. It succeeded. That comes despite the blatantly obvious campaign to take the right to vote away from “felons” and only give a voice (vote) to those who play into the agenda that they (law enforcement) advocate. That is remarkable in itself that the majority of people who have been busted for pot in the past were denied any input into passing that ballot (aka voting) and yet it still passed. Shouldn’t that be a clear enough message to those agencies who keep busting people for weed to maybe take a hike and drop it and maybe put some of that effort into stopping real crimes like ID and property theft, animal cruelty, or here is one, how about violent crimes?
glad they busted them, they probably were not paying taxes on their profits anyway-u cant screw the government and get away with it
Robbing people for growing a plant…impressive. *sarcasm*
Where are the REAL drug busts?! Last time I checked weed is legal. Never should have been in prohibition to begin with. This Is retarded. No one is impressed.
So the premise that legalizing marijuana would eliminate the need for enforcement because legal pot would make illegal stuff obsolete.
Another of the big lies spun by the folks who wanted it legalized coming to not true. Once WA State gets done adding all the taxes to the legal pot it will be much cheaper to buy it on the black market.
Sell it back to the State and double that stack of cash!
Or weapons of mass destruction, proof of global warming, ballots of uncounted votes, missing bicycles, etc…..
BFD.. where’s the big pile of heroin, oxy, meth. . .