By DON FLETCHER
News Staff Writer
Two Atmore men, a Perdido man and a Bay Minette man were among the most recent individuals arrested after city police on routine patrol pulled over their respective vehicles for various equipment violations.
No tag
The first incident happened around 9:45 p.m. on April 11, when a patrol officer noticed a vehicle with no tag traveling along Martin Luther King Drive. The vehicle was pulled over, and the policeman asked the driver — 37-year-old Dudley Flowers of Perdido — for consent to search it.
Police reports show Flowers first gave consent, then rescinded it, so the officer requested a K9 unit from the Escambia County Sheriff’s Office and issued a traffic citation as he and the suspect waited.
The dog quickly “alerted” on the vehicle, and officers discovered two white pills, later identified as hydrocodone, in a baggie inside a cigarette box. They also found “several crystal-like rocks” that later tested positive as methamphetamine.
Flowers, who was charged with two counts of possession of a controlled substance and one count of possession of drug paraphernalia, was released on a $5,000 bond shortly after his arrest.
Erratic driving
The second arrest occurred just after midnight, April 16, when a vehicle was pulled over for the driver’s failure to maintain his lane while driving along Alabama 21.
The driver, Joshua Rodgers, 26, of Atmore, gave officers his consent to search his vehicle, and they did.
The search yielded a clear glass pipe and a clear, crystal-like substance that tested positive for methamphetamine. The officer also discovered plastic straws that had residue in them that also tested positive for methamphetamine.
Rodgers, who is charged with one count each of possession of a controlled substance and possession of drug paraphernalia, remained in jail late Monday, April 18, under a $5,000 bond.
Expired tag
The next APD arrest that turned up illegal substances also happened April 16, around 4:55 p.m. on Jack Springs Road.
A vehicle was pulled over after a patrol officer saw that it had an expired Florida tag on it. When the cop activated his blue lights, the driver — later identified as Thomas Anthony White, 60, of Atmore — refused to pull over, continuing at a slow speed as he was spotted “moving around in the seat.”
As the APD officer approached the vehicle he observed White “reaching around on the floorboard.” The officer asked White to step out of the vehicle, and he did so, but “continued to try and go into his pockets” as he did.
A small bulge in White’s sock turned out to be a small, crystal-like rock that tested positive for methamphetamine. Also discovered were a clear glass pipe, with white residue, inside a brown paper bag. The residue tested positive for methamphetamine, and White was charged with one count each of possession of a controlled substance and possession of drug paraphernalia.
He remained in the county jail late Monday, April 18, under bond of $5,000.
Domestic dope
Police didn’t have to travel far to arrest an Atmore man, 20-year-old Hunter Seth Knighten, on a felony drug possession charge more than a month ago.
The incident that led to Knighten’s arrest occurred around 4:19 p.m. March 9 when police were dispatched to the rear parking lot of Atmore Police Department in reference to a domestic incident that was ongoing inside a vehicle. The suspect alleged threatened to harm the victim during their argument.
While investigating the domestic aspects of the incident, officers discovered a plastic baggie containing a substance that tested positive for methamphetamine.
Knighten was charged with one count of possession of a controlled substance and issued a summons that stood until room became available in the county jail. He was booked into the facility Monday, April 18, under a $5,000 bond.