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MAGNA — A Unified police officer discovered 22 pounds of marijuana after stopping to help a stranded motorist on the side of the road Monday, police said.
The officer was traveling on I-80 near 7200 West at about 2:30 p.m. when a motorist in front of him pulled over to the side of the road and put on his hazard lights, according to Unified Police Lt. Justin Hoyal. He said the officer stopped to lend aid and make sure the driver was OK, but eventually became suspicious of the driver while they were talking.
A Utah Highway Patrol officer with a drug-sniffing K-9 joined the Unified police officer. The dog sniffed around the car and led the officers to the marijuana in the trunk of the car. There was also a small amount of methamphetamine, Hoyal said.
“It was a very significant amount of marijuana that was found, and it was just one of our officers stopping to help a motorist on the side of the road,” he said. “You just never know what you’re going to come across when you think you’re stopping to just help somebody.”
The driver, 49-year-old Leonard Bargas from Fresno, Calif, was passing through Utah from California in a rental car. He was arrested for investigation of drug distribution and booked into the Salt Lake County Jail.
Hoyal valued the marijuana at $66,000.
“This is a very large amount of marijuana they have been able to locate,” Hoyal said. “We’re happy to get that off the street.”
That bust came on the heels of another one on Sunday on I-80 near 6500 West. A UHP trooper pulled over a vehicle that was following a semitrailer truck too closely, according to a Salt Lake County Jail report. The trooper took the driver into his patrol car and was going to issue him a warning.
The driver claimed he and two passengers had been in Reno on a gambling trip, according to the report. The driver had a license from North Carolina. One passenger had a driver's license from Texas and a woman in the back seat had a Colorado driver's license. There was also a 2-month-old child in a car seat.
The trooper soon discovered the driver, Anthony Wilson, 30, had a suspended driver's license, a criminal drug history, and his story didn't match what the passengers were saying, the report states.
Initially, the trooper was not given permission to search the car. "He just questioned me as to why I would want to search the vehicle because there was nothing illegal there," the trooper wrote.
After the woman was taken aside from the rest of the group, she said they had been in California and she gave permission to search the car. In the trunk, the trooper found 12 vacuum-sealed bags of marijuana, the report states. The marijuana weighed a total of 12 pounds.
Wilson and the male passenger were arrested for investigation of drug possession. The woman and her child were released.
Since Feb. 20, Utah Highway Patrol troopers have made 13 marijuana busts statewide, seizing an estimated 665 pounds of marijuana and 7 pounds of methamphetamine in addition to some heroin. Troopers say during the traditional harvesting season for marijuana growers, the number of busts along the freeways go up.
Contributing: Peter Samore and Pat Reavy
