Bust yields 15 grams of heroin

PALMER — A whole lot of police work over the course of an evening led a Wasilla officer to almost 15 grams of black tar heroin with a street value of $6,000.

According to an affidavit officer Don Ridge filed in the case against Michael Schneider, 31, of Wasilla, the case began Dec. 11 with a call about a couple smoking from a straight glass pipe — the type used for meth or crack — in a Honda Accord in the parking lot of the Best Western Lake Lucille Inn. The man had a gun on his hip.

Ridge writes that the Honda was registered to a North Pole resident who, according to hotel staff, had checked in that evening.

So, Ridge writes, he went to the hotel and knocked on the man’s door. Much shuffling inside ensued with the peephole covering and uncovering multiple times. Eventually the man came to the door.

“He acted nervous by having shaking hands, stuttering speech, low and raspy voice, repeatedly rubbing his face, constantly leaning on the door for balance, crossing his arms and held the door open just enough for him to stand between the door and the door frame,” Ridge writes.

The officer didn’t get consent to search the man or his car. So Ridge went to the parking lot to check records and keep an eye on the Honda.

Just before midnight two men showed up in an older Ford Bronco, went into the hotel, walked past the front desk clerk to one of the rooms. Ridge said neither carried bags into the hotel but both had bags when leaving.

So he tailed the Bronco.

“Based on my experience of investigating drug use and distribution and further based on the report of drug use by the (people in the room) while making repeated trips to their car while possessing a firearm; making a reservation the same day as checking and being from the Fairbanks area for only one night; based on (the man in the room’s) nervous and deceptive actions and statements; based on his unwillingness to watch a police (dog) sniff his car; based on two males arriving at the hotel without any bags in a vehicle not recognized by the front desk clerk within only 30 minutes of me contacting (the man in the room); based on the two males leaving with multiple bags within only a few minutes of entering the hotel,” Ridge writes, “I suspected the occupants of the Ford Bronco were also involved in illegal drug possession and distribution.”

So he pulled the Bronco over.

Inside the Bronco, Ridge found Schneider and the registered owner of the Bronco, Jobie Karr.

Schneider had a gun that he said wasn’t his and told Ridge there were no drugs in the car. But a police dog found 14.97 grams of heroin and 2.3 ounces of marijuana.

Karr was charged with a misdemeanor drug crime for the weed and Schneider with felony drug crimes and a weapons misconduct charge under the statutes outlawing possession of a gun while committing a drug crime. Karr was not arrested. Schneider has since made bail and been released from jail. Neither person in the hotel room was charged with a crime in this case, according to court records.

Contact Andrew Wellner at 352-2270 or andrew.wellner@frontiersman.com.