RANGELEY — Police responded to a complaint of a loud party on Pleasant Street at a vacant house at about midnight Wednesday and ended up charging a teenager with trafficking in marijuana.
Rangeley Police officer Jared Austin said he charged Jordan Richard, 18, of Rangeley, by summons with unlawful trafficking in a schedule Z drug: marijuana, illegal transportation of drugs by a minor and sale and use of drug paraphernalia. He has a court date of Sept. 22 in Farmington.
Austin said he and Franklin County Sheriff’s Deputies Cpl. Nate Bean and Nate Reid, who were in the area, responded to the loud-party report.
As he approached the house in his cruiser, Austin said he could see underage drinking going on in the residence and hear loud music.
Police went up to the door and knocked and the lights went out and the music went off and kids run upstairs, he said.
Austin said he went back into the driveway and started running license plate numbers of the vehicles parked there.
Bean saw a small bag of marijuana sticking out from a backpack in one of the cars and his police dog, Diesel, who is trained in drug detection, hit on the car that had drugs in it, Austin said.
Police contacted the registered owner of the vehicle and the kids parents came to the house and gave Austin permission to open the vehicle. The vehicle was locked so a RP Auto Body & Repair representative was called in to unlock it, he said.
Austin searched the vehicle and located the backpack.
Inside the backpack there were several small bags of marijuana packaged for sale, he said.
There was also a small jar of marijuana, a plastic bag full of marijuana, packaging materials and drug paraphernalia, Austin said.
Police called the owner of the house that is normally unoccupied and that person contacted someone else to let police into the house.
Some of the minors had fled the house before police could get inside, Austin said.
The case remains under investigation, he said.
dperry@sunjournal.com
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