WATERVILLE — Four people were arrested and a quantity of heroin was confiscated Friday in a pre-dawn raid prompted by complaints from the community about drug dealing, according to Deputy Chief Charles Rumsey, of the Waterville police.
The search warrants were executed at 5 a.m. in raids at 4 May St.
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Police found $3,500 worth of heroin in the apartment and took one of the residents to a hospital so that heroin she had secreted in a body cavity could be removed, Rumsey said.
The woman, Shakieta Rhodes-Jones, 27, a resident of the apartment, was charged with aggravated selling of scheduled drugs within 1,000 feet of a designated safe zone, a Drummond Street park.
Rumsey said the heroin found on her person, which was stored in a balloon, included enough for 24 street-level doses of the drug. She was taken first to the Waterville police station, where a state police drug-sniffing dog gave indications that a quantity of narcotics was secreted inside her body.
“While she was at MaineGeneral being evaluated, we recovered 2.5 grams of heroin packaged inside her,” Rumsey said. Rhodes-Jones was released on $6,000 unsecured bail and is due to face the charges in Kennebec Superior Court on April 13.
While conducting the raid, police made three other arrests.
Maxim Turmelle, 24, a resident of the apartment, was charged with refusing to submit to arrest or detention. Rumsey said Turmelle became uncooperative, combative and disrupted as the search warrant was executed.
Police said Justin Thomas, 27, of College Avenue, was charged with aggravated theft after one of the officers in the raid recognized him as the suspect in the theft of a case of beer from the Cumberland Farms store on College Avenue the previous evening. Rumsey said that with a prior conviction for theft, Thomas would face an aggravated charge.
Ashley Vigue, 28, of King Street, also was arrested at the scene, on outstanding warrants alleging failure to pay fines in cases involving drunken driving and driving with a suspended license.
Rumsey said no further arrests are expected in the case, which had been under investigation by police Detective Duane Cloutier for the past month.
Fairfield police assisted in the raid. Police said they recovered about $3,500 in cash, “usable” marijuana and digital scales.
Rumsey said information from the public was important in the case.
“It was a number of members of the community who approached us with information because they were concerned with what was going on at that address,” Rumsey said.
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