BELLOWS FALLS — A multi-department effort led to the arrests of 11 people on May 16 on a variety of heroin-related charges.
According to Lt. Shane Harris of the Bellows Falls Police Department, eight police departments and 21 officers were engaged in the drug arrests in the morning hours.
Harris, the lieutenant in charge of the investigation, told The Commons the probe had been going on for “several weeks” but declined to be more specific.
According to a press release, this investigation was the result of ongoing cooperation between community members and law enforcement “in identifying individuals and groups responsible for the trafficking of heroin and other opioids in this community.”
Harris confirmed that police departments in Chester, Wilmington, Dover, and Walpole, N.H., assisted by Vermont State Police, the Windham County Sheriff's Department, and Walpole police, were called in to help the BFPD, as they did not have enough manpower to safely make that many arrests.
All of the arrests were made in the Village of Bellows Falls, Harris reported, “except for Brandon Arie, who was located in Saxtons River. All of the offenses for which they were arrested for occurred in the Village of Bellows Falls.”
Two of the subjects, Jason Cray, 26, and Keith Tyrell Jr., both of Bellows Falls, were arraigned May 16 in Windham District Court in Brattleboro.
Cray pleaded not guilty to amended charges of felony sale of less than 200 milligrams of heroin, and misdemeanor possession of less than 200 milligrams. He was released on $25,000 bail, and conditions of release.
Tyrell is housed at the Southeast Vermont Correctional Facility in Springfield, having failed to post $10,000 bail at the arraignment that had been set earlier, stemming from felony charges from arrests on April 28 and 30, relating to sale of heroin and a regulated narcotic. A pre-trial conference is set for Aug. 13.
The remaining individuals were taken into custody and transported to either the Bellows Falls Police Department, Springfield Police Department, or the Vermont State Police's Rockingham barracks, where they were processed, cited, and released.
They are scheduled to be arraigned in July in Windham District Court in Brattleboro.
The other individuals arrested are:
• Brandon Arie, 30, of Saxtons River; one count of sale and possession of heroin.
• Phil Euber, 26, of Bellows Falls; two counts of sale and possession of heroin.
• Greg Turner, 33, of Bellows Falls; two counts of sale and possession of heroin.
• Glenn Turner, 34, of Westminster; one count of sale and possession of a regulated drug.
• Amber Nichols, 32, of Springfield, Vt.; sale of a regulated drug.
• Dustin Re, 22, of Bellows Falls; one count of sale and possession of a regulated drug and one count of sale and possession of heroin.
• Courtney Stone, 26, of Bellows Falls; one count of sale and possession of heroin.
• Robert Blodgett, 51, of Grafton; one count of sale of a regulated drug.
• Dan Forbush, 26, of Bellows Falls; one count of sale and possession of heroin, one count of sale and possession of cocaine, one count of sale and possession of a regulated drug.