Vandergrift police arrest 2 in methamphetamine drug bust
A Vandergrift police investigation resulted in the seizure of $20,000 worth of crystal methamphetamine Saturday.
Patrolman Bill Moore, the department's narcotics investigator, said officers worked with the Postal Service to identify drugs allegedly being mailed from California to Michael Medina at 509 Burns St.
Moore said police were notified another package had arrived for Medina on Saturday at the Vandergrift Post Office.
Inside the padded envelope, police found a plastic bag filled with 0.77 of an ounce of alleged meth crystals, which Moore estimated would sell for $20,000 on the street.
Police requested a search warrant and went to the house Medina, 42, shares with Paul Connor, 32.
Moore said both men were arrested without incident and taken into custody.
Both will be charged with felony counts of drug possession with the intent to deliver, according to Moore.
After searching the house and a U-Haul moving van the pair were using, Moore said police found evidence of drug use and packaging, including hypodermic needles, scales, packaging materials and bottles of pills prescribed to others.
Patrolman Joe Gray said police had the county's hazardous materials team and firefighters on standby in case police found signs that methamphetamine was being produced in the house. It's a volatile process that can be a health hazard for residents and neighbors.
But police said there was no indication the house was used as a meth lab.
Moore and Gray thanked neighbors who reported the unusually large amount of people and cars stopping at the house on residential Burns Street, which helped to tip off police something may be amiss.
A neighboring couple said the men moved in about a month ago and seemed friendly, if overly “nebby.” The neighbors said the men claimed to have moved there from California, but Moore said they most recently were living on Walnut Street in Vandergrift and in North Apollo.
Neighbors said a security system was installed at the house about a week ago and pounding could be heard late into the night, leading neighbors to suspect they were remodeling. No signs of renovation were evident outside the well-kept house, but plaster-speckled drywall could be seen through the open front door.
“There was one heck of a lot of traffic in and out of there,” said a neighboring woman, who declined to give her name.
Moore estimated the pair was receiving a shipment of alleged drugs once a week, a quantity Gray said is significant for a borough the size of Vandergrift.
Police said they've been investigating Medina and Connor for about two months.
“I've been working on it,” Moore told neighbors on Burns Street. “It didn't fall on deaf ears.”
Liz Hayes is a Tribune-Review staff writer. She can be reached at 724-226-4680 or lhayes@tribweb.com.
