Three enter pleas on drug charges

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    Three people whose drug-related arrests stemmed from an on-going theft investigation appeared in Baxter County Circuit Court Thursday and all entered not guilty pleas to the charges filed against them.

    24-year-old Dustin Trevor Horn, 20-year-old Cassie Cleland, both of Mountain Home, and 21-year-old Cassondra Avila, who lists a Redding, California address on the Baxter County jail log, were arrested January 2nd when Mountain Home Police went to a local apartment complex as part of a theft investigation and found five pounds of marijuana, drug paraphernalia and $1,400 in cash.

    According to court records, officers initially saw four marijuana cigarettes on top of a nightstand and then located digital scales covered with what was described as narcotic residue, as well as an unzipped suitcase lying next to a bed that contained multiple vacuum-sealed bags that had the odor of marijuana. According to investigators, evidence suggested that a quantity of marijuana has been processed for sale in the bedroom of the apartment.

    A safe located in the closet of the master bedroom contained approximately five pounds of what was described as “high grade” marijuana.

    In addition to the drug-related charges, Horn faces the revocation of a 10-year suspended sentence handed down in June of last year after he entered a no contest plea to charges stemming from his role in a somewhat bizarre “staged robbery” that took place in late 2014.

    Horn appeared in Circuit Court in November and entered a “not true” plea to charges that he had violated the terms and conditions of his probation by being involved in a situation that led him to be charged with 3rd degree domestic battery.

    Horn was one of three friends who planned and executed the “robbery” of an acquaintance. The staged robbery took place in late December 2014 near the intersection of Charles Blackburn Drive and County Road 390.

    Horn and the other two conspirators — then 20-year-old Chayse Brown and 19-year-old Tyler Elizabeth Akers — were each given 10 years probation for their parts in the incident.

    In the new drug-related cases just filed, Horn, Avila and Cleland, all entered not guilty pleas. Cleland is free on $20,000 bond, Horn and Avila are inmates in the Baxter County jail with bond set at $20,000 each.

    Horn was ordered to reappear in Circuit Court January 26th for a hearing to determine if his suspended sentence handed down in the staged robbery case is to be revoked. Avila will reappear on that same date and Cleland was given a reappearance date of April 23rd.




   

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