State and local law enforcement officers paid surprise visits to nearly three dozen homes in White County Thursday as part of the county’s crackdown on drugs.
Officers, acting on tips from the public, fanned out across the county knocking on doors asking people if they could search their homes. They went to thirty-one locations, according to Mitchell Posey with the Appalachian Regional Drug Enforcement Office (ARDEO). He says officers knocked on doors “asking nicely to search for illegal narcotics and stolen items.”
“The goal of this operation was to remove all illegal narcotics from our streets and to deter drug dealers from selling illegal narcotics or being in possession of stolen items in White County,” Posey says.
The joint operation involved officers from the White County Sheriff’s Office, the Cleveland Police Department, the Department of Community Supervision, the Department of Corrections K-9 unit, and ARDEO.
They nabbed two suspects.
41-year-old Adam Chadwick Moody of Clermont was arrested at 2548 Skitts Mountain Road for allegedly trafficking methamphetamine. Officers seized approximately 4 ounces of meth, Posey says.
30-year-old Angel Nicole Piper was arrested at her residence at 128 Donald Alexander Road. Officers say they found a small quantity of methamphetamine in her home. Piper is charged with possession of meth.
The street value of the illegal narcotics seized is $13,000.
Piper and Moody were transported to the White County Detention Center.
While officers may have anticipated more arrests based on the information they received, Posey considers the operation a success.
“We feel these operations are always successful because we either remove harmful drugs from our streets or we deter criminals from being around illegal narcotics and stolen property because they don’t know if today is the day we will knock on their door,” he says.
