Oak Bluffs police have identified a 50-year-old Oak Bluffs man who was found dead in a Barnes Road residence Wednesday as James Christopher (Chris) Walker. The cause of death remains under investigation, police said. Mr. Walker's roommate has been charged with heroin trafficking.
In what was called a rare event on Martha’s Vineyard, an Idaho man was arrested Tuesday for possessing crystal methamphetamine.
Lance P. Ragsdale, 41, was arrested after Edgartown police and state police executed a search warrant for a Road to the Plains home, Edgartown Det. Sgt. Chris Dolby said.
Drug task force officers arrested Fernando A. Jesurum, 26, after he arrived on the Island via ferry Tuesday night, Edgartown Det. Michael Snowden said in a statement of facts about the case. He was arraigned Thursday in Edgartown district court on charges of possession to distribute a class B drug (cocaine), subsequent offense and cocaine trafficking. Bail was set at $40,000 cash.
Two Martha’s Vineyard men are facing drug charges after a Martha’s Vineyard Drug Task Force investigation into heroin distribution. Roan W. Elgart, 37, of West Tisbury, was arraigned on charges of possessing to distribute a class A drug (heroin), possessing to distribute a class E drug (Clonazepam), conspiracy to violate drug law, and possessing to distribute a class D drug (marijuana). Luke Depriest, 33, of Oak Bluffs, was charged with being present where heroin is kept and conspiracy to violate drug law.
A Dukes County grand jury indicted two people on Monday, one on drug trafficking charges and another for statutory rape.
Mitefea Kelly, 18, was indicted on one count of trafficking cocaine in the amount of 200 grams or more.
Ms. Kelly, a New York resident, was arrested in August for allegedly coming to the Island with more than 270 grams of cocaine, part of what members of the Martha’s Vineyard Drug Task Force said was an operation to bring large amounts of cocaine to the Vineyard. Bail was set in her case at $200,000
No big deal? That may be a widely held view about marijuana on this
Island, but a discussion this week about marijuana use by students of
the Martha's Vineyard High School turned into a big deal indeed.
Just three days after an article appeared in the Gazette about the
presence and use of pot on the high school campus, school leaders
reacted sharply, not just to the message but also to the messenger, high
school principal Peg Regan.
An Accepting Culture Is Cited as School Eyes Marijuana Use
By CHRIS BURRELL
For students at the Martha's Vineyard Regional High School,
it's as commonplace as the pencils and notebooks: kids bringing
marijuana to school or showing up for class when they're high.
The principal describes it as "epidemic," and students
say pot is pervasive, used by a vast number of their peers on campus.
Six people — three from the same Vineyard Haven family — were arrested on felony drug charges earlier this week following one of the largest heroin busts in Island history.
Members of the Martha’s Vineyard Drug Task force executed a search warrant at the Garde home on Spring street in Vineyard Haven just after 6 p.m. Tuesday and seized nearly $70,000 in heroin, cash and other drugs. Officers arrested three members of the Garde family and three other suspects for alledgedly running a drug operation out of the home.
An aerial drug sweep of the Island this month by the Massachusetts State Police and federal Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) task force found 169 illegal marijuana plants. Authorities are still investigating who planted the crops and have yet to make any arrests or issue summonses.
“There will be charges, maybe this week,” said state police Sergeant Jeff Stone, also head of the Martha’s Vineyard Drug Task Force. “But as of right now the investigation is ongoing.”
Martha’s Vineyard school authorities have confirmed the exclusion of four high school students for six months over alleged drug infractions, although the exact nature of the offenses remains vague and contentious.
The four were barred from the school for the remainder of this school year and the first three months of next year, as a result of an investigation which began in early April.
According to the superintendent of schools, Dr. James H. Weiss, who this week completed a review of the cases, they involved a small amount of marijuana.
