Paint Street apartment tenants sentenced after police search

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Casey A. Skaggs, 37, was sentenced Monday to two years of supervision after a citizen phoned a complaint about drug activity into the Washington Court House Police Department.

Skaggs’s apartment in the 400 block of East Paint Street was a hub of criminal activity the day of Dec. 11, 2016. A total of four people inside the apartment had active warrants and were detained, two loaded handguns were located, and various bags of cocaine and marijuana were confiscated, according to reports.

Skaggs opened the door and identified himself to police. Police found that he had an active warrant out of the Sabina Police Department in Clinton County. Skaggs was taken into custody on the warrant.

The following chronological events led to Skaggs’s indictment later by a Fayette County grand jury.

Behind Skaggs’s apartment the police observed several vehicles. An officer spoke to a man sitting in one of the vehicles who said he was waiting on his son, who was inside the apartment dropping off money. When police checked their warrant system for the son’s name, it was found that the son had an active warrant out for his arrest.

The police officers went back to the front door of Skaggs’s apartment. A person who identified herself as a resident answered the door. The resident, identified as Tuesday Toner, told police that the son was not inside the apartment but gave permission for the police to check, according to reports. Toner, 35, was found to have an active warrant as well.

Once inside, police officers found several men and women hiding throughout the apartment.

Two men were in the living room where officers “observed a loaded handgun sitting on the couch,” according to reports. Another person was found in a bedroom. Next, officers located two people in the bathroom. A man was sitting on the toilet. A woman, identified as Jamie Morgan, 35, was holding a 3-year-old child, reports said. She was allegedly carrying a hypodermic needle and drug paraphernalia in her bra.

Charged with having a drug abuse instrument, Morgan’s charge was later dismissed by the Washington Court House Municipal Court in an agreement; several charges were filed against Morgan at around the same time. Her jail time was suspended and she was ordered to complete treatment.

While clearing the apartment for weapons and people, the officers located another loaded handgun under the bed.

Those who were detained told the officers the loaded handguns belonged to the father of the child, who had departed from the apartment before the officers arrived.

Another man in the apartment originally gave police officers a false name and was found to have “several small baggies of an off-white substance” in his pocket, identified as cocaine. The man had some marijuana in his “long John underwear,” according to reports, and once the officer removed it, the man advised that he had “a little bit more in his underwear.” Along with the drugs, $418 in cash was confiscated from his pocket. The man was identified as Marcus James, 36, who also had an active warrant.

James plead guilty in March to aggravated possession of cocaine and was sentenced to nine months in prison.

In other areas inside the residence, a cellophane baggy containing “two large off-white rocks” tested positive for cocaine, according to reports, and officers “located more baggies of crack and marijuana in the dresser that was in the living room.” Skaggs and Toner, the apartment’s tenants, were each charged with possession of cocaine, a felony of the fifth degree, permitting drug abuse, a misdemeanor of the first degree, and obstructing official business, a misdemeanor of the second degree.

Toner was sentenced in the Fayette County Court of Common Pleas May 4 to two years of supervision and ordered to complete residential treatment at Fayette Women’s Recovery. Skaggs’s two years of supervision handed to him Monday will be with the Fayette County Adult Probation Department and he is additionally ordered to perform 40 hours of community service.

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By Ashley Bunton

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Ashley may be contacted by calling her at (740) 313-0355 or by searching Twitter.com for @ashbunton

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