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dwpineal
Psychedelic Artist



Registered: 07/20/06
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Winston-Salem man complains about police raid in which he was arrested
#18610022 - 07/25/13 02:37 PM (10 years, 9 months ago) |
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http://www.journalnow.com/news/local/article_e8430388-f4b5-11e2-8bce-0019bb30f31a.html
Winston-Salem man complains about police raid in which he was arrested
Posted: Wednesday, July 24, 2013 7:08 pm
John Hinton/Winston-Salem Journal
A Winston-Salem man has filed a complaint with the Winston-Salem Police Department because of the harsh treatment he said he received when officers arrested him two years ago on drug charges that kept him in jail for eight months before they were eventually dismissed.
Jonathan Ryan Nicholas, 33, who now lives on Old Vineyard Road, told the Winston-Salem City Council about his case last week during its public-comment period. Nicholas said he filed his complaint with the police department’s professional standards division.
A search warrant, arrest warrants, court records and a police document confirmed the series of events that Nicholas recounted.
Police Chief Barry Rountree spoke to Nicholas briefly about his case after the city council meeting. Rountree declined to comment about the case because the professional standards division is reviewing it.
The incident began shortly after 3 p.m. on April 8, 2011, when 18 officers arrived at a house in the 2400 block of Westfield Avenue to execute a search warrant, according to a police document. At the time, Nicholas was renting a room in the house, he said.
Investigators had received a tip from an informant that a marijuana plant was growing in the house, according to the search warrant. The informant also told police that another man who lived in the house had threatened to kill a police officer if he got the chance and that the man had access to a 12-gauge shotgun.
Eight of the 18 officers had their weapons drawn when they used an explosive breach on the rear basement door to enter the house, according to the police document. The officers were part of the department’s Special Enforcement Team.
Nicholas, who was in the home when the explosion occurred, walked out the front door, but officers tackled him, resulting in two scrapes on his face, he told the council. His injury took two months to heal, he said.
“This was, by far, the most traumatic experience I ever had in my life,” he said. “When the current system can allow something like this to happen, it means something fundamental needs to change.”
Officers then detained Nicholas and put him in a patrol car, the police document said. Other officers searched the house but didn’t find any marijuana plants, according to Nicholas and the police document.
However, officers found two baggies containing mushrooms, a digital scale in Nicholas’ bedroom, a jar containing marijuana and a bong.
Officers also seized what they described as a marijuana grinder and several glass marijuana pipes. Police called the mushrooms an illegal hallucinogenic, Nicholas told the council.
Nicholas later told police that he had moved into the house a month before the officers raided it and that he didn’t know of any drug activity taking place there, according to the police document. Nicholas admitted to police that he and the other man had smoked marijuana on at least one occasion.
Nicholas was later charged with three counts of felony possession of a controlled substance with intent to manufacture, sell and deliver it within 1,000 feet of a park, arrest warrants say. Nicholas had lived near Miller Park in the Ardmore neighborhood.
Nicholas also was charged with felony maintaining a house to store a controlled substance; felony possession of marijuana;, felony possession with intent to manufacture, sell and deliver a controlled substance; and misdemeanor possession of drug paraphernalia, according to the warrants. The other man at the house was charged with similar offenses.
A police officer accused Nicholas of possessing less than a half-ounce of psilocybin, a species of hallucinogenic mushroom, and possessing nearly 2 ounces of marijuana, scales and a bong, the warrants said.
Nicholas was initially held in the Forsyth County jail with his bond set at $75,000, a court record shows. He stayed there for eight months and five days until judge lowered his bond to $25,000. Nicholas then posted the bond and was released from the jail on Dec. 8, 2011.
During his jail stay, Nicholas asked his attorney, Richard Ramsey, why he couldn’t have a probable cause hearing in front of a judge. Nicholas said Ramsey told him that those hearings typically didn’t occur because the courtrooms are too crowded.
Ramsey couldn’t be reached for comment.
In October 2012, a prosecutor dismissed the charges against Nicholas, saying that there was insufficient evidence to prosecute him, according to a court record.
The State Bureau of Investigation lab in Raleigh also tested the mushroom and other items seized in the raid, and results came back negative for controlled substances, and investigators couldn’t link the marijuana found in the house to Nicholas, the court record said.
District Attorney Jim O’Neill said Friday that delays in testing evidence at the SBI lab was partly the reason for Nicholas’ long stay in jail.
“That’s a big part of it,” O’Neill said. “It can ultimately hurt defendants who could have been helped by quick exonerations.”
At the council meeting, Mayor Allen Joines told Nicholas that he could ask for a police internal investigation and file a complaint with the city’s Citizens’ Police Review Board.
“This is not just about me,” Nicholas said last Thursday. “This is about the town that I have known and loved for over 20 years. We should all be able to live here comfortably and not be brutalized, arrested and thrown in jail when we have done nothing wrong.”
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hidenseek1
Its got all the dinks.
Registered: 12/22/12
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Re: Winston-Salem man complains about police raid in which he was arrested [Re: dwpineal]
#18610119 - 07/25/13 02:56 PM (10 years, 9 months ago) |
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Quote:
The State Bureau of Investigation lab in Raleigh also tested the mushroom and other items seized in the raid, and results came back negative for controlled substances, and investigators couldn’t link the marijuana found in the house to Nicholas, the court record said.
this is weird, so he had dried? mushrooms that wernt droogs
and pipes that didnt have thc residue on them?
im confused
-------------------- You can drink at 7 A.M., because the Beastie Boys fought for that right -------------------------------------------------------------------------- pons asinorum -------------------------------------------------------------------------- lsd and the vietnam war changed music forever
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trampis
mad hatter


Registered: 01/01/06
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Re: Winston-Salem man complains about police raid in which he was arrested [Re: hidenseek1]
#18610313 - 07/25/13 03:30 PM (10 years, 9 months ago) |
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I have dried mushrooms stored in a jar that are medicinal (reishi). All of my pipes are completely clean aside from one wooden pipe which has only ever been used for tobacco
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thirtygoats


Registered: 12/29/11
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Re: Winston-Salem man complains about police raid in which he was arrested [Re: dwpineal] 2
#18611227 - 07/25/13 06:40 PM (10 years, 9 months ago) |
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lol @ 18 cops for a report of 1 weed plant. what a bunch of idiots.
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hidenseek1
Its got all the dinks.
Registered: 12/22/12
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Re: Winston-Salem man complains about police raid in which he was arrested [Re: thirtygoats]
#18611429 - 07/25/13 07:16 PM (10 years, 9 months ago) |
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Quote:
thirtygoats said: lol @ 18 cops for a report of 1 weed plant. what a bunch of idiots.
Quote:
The informant also told police that another man who lived in the house had threatened to kill a police officer if he got the chance and that the man had access to a 12-gauge shotgun.
if i was a cop, id want a reasonable sized team to deal with a maniac with a shotty
although 18 does sound rather large
-------------------- You can drink at 7 A.M., because the Beastie Boys fought for that right -------------------------------------------------------------------------- pons asinorum -------------------------------------------------------------------------- lsd and the vietnam war changed music forever
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k00laid
NEMO


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Re: Winston-Salem man complains about police raid in which he was arrested [Re: hidenseek1] 2
#18613685 - 07/26/13 08:32 AM (10 years, 9 months ago) |
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except there was no maniac with a shotty.
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hidenseek1
Its got all the dinks.
Registered: 12/22/12
Posts: 5,423
Loc: poop
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Re: Winston-Salem man complains about police raid in which he was arrested [Re: k00laid]
#18613899 - 07/26/13 09:38 AM (10 years, 9 months ago) |
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yes, informants are a unreliable source of information, but they thought there was a cop killer with a 12 gauge
-------------------- You can drink at 7 A.M., because the Beastie Boys fought for that right -------------------------------------------------------------------------- pons asinorum -------------------------------------------------------------------------- lsd and the vietnam war changed music forever
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Chuckfinely
another round for me an my buddy

Registered: 06/27/13
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Re: Winston-Salem man complains about police raid in which he was arrested [Re: hidenseek1] 1
#18614006 - 07/26/13 10:09 AM (10 years, 9 months ago) |
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So all it takes to have 18 officers break down your door and put guns in your face is one pissed off friend, one ex girlfriend, or even a fucking wrong address from a tip with what could easily be made up information.
The more i read news stories the more i want to move to a shack in the middle of the jungle and not exist anymore. I would be safer with malaria infested mosquitos and tigers then i am in my home. What if a year from now my ex wife gets drunk and calls the police saying i have guns when i dont?
:runandhide:
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SCleROTiUM_LICK
ResearchedFiction Writer


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Re: Winston-Salem man complains about police raid in which he was arrested [Re: Chuckfinely]
#18616953 - 07/26/13 07:44 PM (10 years, 9 months ago) |
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Quote:
Nicholas, who was in the home when the explosion occurred, walked out the front door, but officers tackled him, resulting in two scrapes on his face, he told the council. His injury took two months to heal, he said.
“This was, by far, the most traumatic experience I ever had in my life,” he said. “When the current system can allow something like this to happen, it means something fundamental needs to change.”
I'm sorry. This guy did get a raw deal, but those two paragraphs together like that made me lol.
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Synthe
Gatorade me, bitch!



Registered: 11/10/12
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Re: Winston-Salem man complains about police raid in which he was arrested [Re: dwpineal]
#18619169 - 07/27/13 10:35 AM (10 years, 9 months ago) |
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Quote:
A police officer accused Nicholas of possessing less than a half-ounce of psilocybin, a species of hallucinogenic mushroom
Um, what? are they trying to say here? Psilocybin is not a species of hallucinogenic mushroom, it's the active compound IN psychedelic mushrooms such as Cubensis, right?
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trampis
mad hatter


Registered: 01/01/06
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Re: Winston-Salem man complains about police raid in which he was arrested [Re: Synthe]
#18619204 - 07/27/13 10:45 AM (10 years, 9 months ago) |
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Journalist don't actually have to research their topics before they publish an article anymore. They just throw a bunch shit together and hope the editor approves it so that they can get their measly paycheck.
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SmOakland



Registered: 02/26/13
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Re: Winston-Salem man complains about police raid in which he was arrested [Re: trampis]
#18619371 - 07/27/13 11:37 AM (10 years, 9 months ago) |
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Quote:
trampis said: Journalist don't actually have to research their topics before they publish an article anymore. They just throw a bunch shit together and hope the editor approves it so that they can get their measly paycheck.
I agree.
He "had access to a 12-guage shotgun." Lol. Everyone who lives in the United States can go to the store and buy one for under $200, so just about everyone has access to one.
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