SALINE CO.— An observant Saline County Deputy who spotted a vehicle leaving an area cemetery interrupted what appears to have been a pair of men cooking off a batch of methamphetamine.
According to information filed in the case, on December 21, at approximately 11:38 p.m., deputy Craig Williams was on routine patrol on Bankston Road when he spotted the vehicle leaving Bankston Cemetery.
“I was aware that the area is often used to manufacture methamphetamine,” Williams said.
Williams followed the vehicle as it turned east on Bob White Lane and then south on Teal Road.
The deputy said he knew the road to be a dead end and so he waited for the vehicle to turn around and make its way out.
When the vehicle didn’t return, deputy Williams started down Teal Road to complete a security check of the residences in the area.
What he found was the vehicle parked in a private drive at 40 Teal Rd.
When Williams pulled up in his cruiser, two men, identified as passenger William Robert Horn, 32, of 27 South Shaw St., Harrisburg and driver Clifford Wayne Norris, 37, of 2424 Locust St., Eldorado, got out of the vehicle and approached him.
The deputy exited his squad and said he immediately smelled a strong chemical odor so he detained the two men until backup could arrive in the form of deputy Lindsay Agin.
Upon Agin’s arrival the deputies approached the vehicle and the chemical odor became stronger.
Williams spotted a backpack in the passenger floorboard and believed it to be a meth lab.
Explosive
He asked both Norris and Horn if anything in the bag could blow up and hurt him and Norris nodded his head yes.
Agin transported the men to the county detention center while Williams contacted the Meth Response Team to handle the suspected lab.
The MRT found a meth cook bottle in the backpack along with additional methamphetamine chemicals and other manufacturing materials.
They also located a black case containing three hypodermic syringes, a scale, baggies, a spoon with suspected meth residue on it and small vials.
Following the lab clean up by MRT, the vehicle was towed from the scene by Opie’s Towing.
Both men were booked into the county jail on charges of Unlawful Methamphetamine Manufacturing 100-400 grams, Unlawful Possession of Methamphetamine Manufacturing Materials, Unlawful Possession of a Hypodermic Syringe and Unlawful Possession of Drug Paraphernalia.
At the time of his arrest Norris was serving a probation sentence of 24 months, handed him April 14, 2015 after he was convicted of Unlawful Possession of Methamphetamine.
He still owes the county $3,474.12 in fines and fees from that case.
Cash bond has been set in the cases at $2,500 each.