The majority of charges filed by Selma Police following an undercover drug investigation nicknamed Operation Crack Down have been dismissed.
On June 28th, Selma Police began rounding up 17 suspects that had allegedly sold drugs to undercover informants working with narcotics officers during the previous 7 months.
WTSB News has learned charges were dropped this week against 11 of the 17 suspects due to a problem with one of the informants making those drug buys for police.
Police Captain R.L. Daniels said agents were reviewing videos of the undercover buys, which were all secretly recorded, when they noticed something on one of the videos.
Selma Police released this statement to WTSB News on Thursday:
While watching the video of one of the undercover confidential informant (CI) buys, Detective Bass noticed an abnormal action by the CI previously missed, which made Detective Bass take an even closer look at the video. Detective Bass and Detective Captain R.L. Daniels brought the abnormal actions to the attention of the Johnston County District Attorney’s Office. The District Attorney Office reviewed the video and decided to take dismissals on the cases involving the particular CI. This type of action shows the professionalism and integrity the Selma Police Department has working within its Department.
Captain Daniels would not say specifically what the informant did on the video that alarmed police but it only involved one suspect, not the 10 others.
The District Attorney immediately dismissed charges against 11 of the suspects where the CI was used to make the buys. Police said charges against the remaining 6 suspects in Operation Crack Down will move forward in the court system.
WTSB News was unable to reach District Attorney Susan Doyle for a comment on this story before our news deadline.
The 11 defendants where the cases were dismissed against include:Derrick Ruffin, Daquan Frazier, Shantwan Strickland, David Lucas , Brad McDougald, Bobby Perry, Jameil Wiggins, Walter Blanco, Demetris Atkinson, Antwain Groves and Desiree Frazier.
Charges still remain against 6 individuals where a different confidential information was used. They include: Danny McMillan, Lamont Foye, Eddie Atkinson, Bobby Pilkington, Teresa League and Erica Wood.
