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UAPB STUDENT ARRESTED ON DRUG CHARGES

By Ray King/OF THE COMMERCIAL STAFF
Tuesday, November 10, 2009 12:15 AM CST

A student at the University of Arkansas at Pine Bluff who ran from his dorm room after a dorm supervisor went to talk to him was arrested on drug related charges Sunday.

Carlton Hughes, 19, reportedly had three large bags containing 31 individually packaged bags of marijuana, a report from UAPB Police Investigator Eugene Butler said.

Reading from that report during a court hearing Monday, Deputy Prosecutor Nicole Pugh said the supervisor, Roosevelt Brown, went to talk to Hughes and his roommate about dorm violations and when he entered the room, saw marijuana seeds on the floor, then saw Hughes reach into a pair of pants on the floor, pull out a bag containing what appeared to be individual bags of marijuana, then run from the room.

Butler reported that the supervisor called University Police and when Hughes returned to the room, he didn’t have the bag and claimed he ran from the room to smoke a cigarette.

Pugh said a campus officer checked behind a building where Hughes had been seen running and found footprints, then the large bag containing the marijuana. Three small bags of marijuana were found on the ground next to the large bag and the material was sent to the state crime laboratory at Little Rock for analysis.

Butler reported that Hughes waived his right to an attorney and admitted he had the marijuana in his room and ran and hid it when the dorm supervisor came in.

Hughes also reportedly asked to use a cell phone to call his mother to tell her he had been arrested, and Butler reported that he heard the mother ask Hughes if the marijuana was his and he replied “yes.”

Circuit Judge Jodi Dennis set a $2,500 bond for Hughes, who Pugh said had no prior convictions.

Also Monday, the judge set a $10,000 bond for Sidney Farris, 26, after ruling prosecutors had probable cause to charge him with possession of marijuana with intent to deliver and possession of drug paraphernalia, based on an affidavit from vice and narcotics Detective Kenny Evans.

Reading from that affidavit, Deputy Prosecutor Jill Reed said police stopped a car Farris was driving at Harding Avenue and Alabama Street because it had a fictitious license plate on it.

Reed said Farris was arrested after he told police there were warrants for his arrest, and during a search of the car, officers found several clear bags containing a total of 155 grams of marijuana in the vehicle.

A set of digital scales were found when Farris was searched, Evans said in his report.

Reed said Farris was placed on probation in April after being convicted for possession of a controlled substance with intent to deliver and possession of drug paraphernalia, and Dennis said prosecutors would be filing a petition to revoke that probation.

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