METH AND MORE: This photo from Burlington Police Department shows the drugs, firearms and money seized in one of the largest drug busts the city has seen in recent memory.
Over the past month, the Burlington Police Department has been busy with a handful of serious incidents including drug trafficking, car thefts and other alleged crimes.
The biggest development was a drug bust several months in the making. That investigation concluded last Friday with two arrests and the seizure of more than a kilogram of methamphetamine, several ounces of fentanyl and cocaine, two firearms, more than $10,000 in cash and other narcotics.
According to the Burlington Police Department, detectives working with members of BPD’s Emergency Response Unit carried out search warrants in Burlington’s Ledgewood Circle neighborhood, and on Farrell Street in South Burlington. They arrested two suspects — Quenton Dodson, 33, of Detroit and Michoni Campbell, 23, a native of Burlington.
According to a statement from police, “Mr. Dodson has a lengthy and violent criminal history in Michigan, to include shooting three men during a narcotics transaction in Ypsilanti, MI, in 2012.”
Acting Chief of Police Jon Murad commented on the scale of the operation.
“This is one of the largest seizures the BPD has seen in recent memory,” he said. “Countywide, we’ve seen police incidents involving methamphetamine trend upwards for some time now. We can and do promote non-criminal approaches to personal-use drug possession, and we can and should provide services and medically assisted treatment to people who suffer from substance-use disorder.”
Murad said consequences would be more strict for drug dealers.
“But for felony-weight narcotics dealers who feed those disorders, we can and must investigate and arrest. The drug detectives who have been working on this, and our terrific federal partners, did excellent work apprehending these alleged traffickers. Now we’re eager to parlay our casework into a strong prosecution.”
The police press release also had a graph indicating a sharp rise and meth-related crimes over the years.
In June 2020, Burlington City Council voted to reduce police department personnel by more than 30 percent, capping officer staff at 74. In Oct. 2021 however, after the department had trouble providing essential round-the-clock policing, councilors reversed course and voted to allow up to 87 officers.
Other recent crimes: Threat of gun violence, stolen vehicle
On Jan. 9, city police received a call from a woman who said her boyfriend pointed a gun at her and some friends. When the 911 dispatch center contacted police to respond, they noted that the caller had hung up and “now appeared to be in the presence of the boyfriend.”
According to the police report, when officers arrived at the scene they were able to make contact with the boyfriend and the others. The suspect was identified as Terrance Anderson, 54. The statement from police says Anderson had pointed the gun at the girl and threatened to shoot her and then himself.
In a separated incident also on Jan. 9, a vehicle was reported stolen at 9:55 p.m. at Shelburne Road, after someone accidentally left their keys in the car. Essex Police found the car on Jan. 12, but not the suspect, in the area of 27 Susie Wilson Rd. Surveillance footage obtained by police shows a female operating the vehicle on multiple occasions after it was reported stolen.
Michael Bielawski is a reporter for True North. Send him news tips at bielawski82@yahoo.com and follow him on Twitter @TrueNorthMikeB.
Good to hear the police are busting bad guys. We should hear much more of this. Give THEM a raise and stop all this diversity, inclusion and equity crap.
Vermont “Field of Screams”. “Build it and they will come”.
I want Phil Baruth and Martin LaLond to go into downtown Burlington to disarm the felons that could care less about their gun control laws. And someone tell Mr. (waiting Period) Rep. Notte that these felons don’t buy their guns at licensed dealer stores. If you are are criminal there is no waiting period to get your illegal gun. A purple shirt and a necktie is all they need to disarm these predators. Go get um boys and leave us law abiding responsible gun owners alone. And thank you, Burlington PD.
Hmmm…and prostitution was legalized, when, again?
Otherwise known as:
Hegelian dialectics.
I wonder how many of the potheads are part, or are associated with, the Vermont Dem/Prog political class.
Having a raid is on thing, but preventing it from crossing the southern border, recently, stupidly opened by the cabal surrounding in-the-basement Biden, is quite another.
Heads up Vermont- don’t waste a whole lot of money on treating “Substance Use Disorder”.
This is the same old thing with a new pretty name on it that might make people feel good so they agree to dump more money on it.
These addicted people need to agree to be evaluated, diagnosed, treated, have access to effective treatment (key words here) and then they need to do this for the rest of their lives.
How do think this is gonna go? Labor shortage in all the medical fields anyone?
How many crazy people have you met that told you they were crazy?
Well addicts are kinda like this.
And as you can see from this bust, we are not getting far on the battle against the drive to use drugs. Perhaps not allowing them to flood over the borders would help? ya think?
Many addicts are dying today in what is really deaths of despair- have you seen what is going on out there? Life is the hardest now that I’ve seen in over 5 decades now- I think we’d all agree on that.
Perhaps allowing our lives to go on as normal make people less apt to want to kill themselves?
No, making us wear a new free N-95 bird beak mask was not what we were thinking.
Solving addiction, which is largely undiagnosed mental illness, that they are self medicating for, is not going to be solved this way.
It’s going to be solved by not breaking people in Public Education.
How many stories to you want me to write? My memory is long with stunning levels of details.
Laura,
Why have even more of inefficient social programs, and spend more money on those unproductive people?
Increase the police raids, while expensive, would be much more effective to stamp it out.
In Amsterdam, pot was legalized, and all sorts of goog-heads, from all over the world, descended on Amsterdam.
Make it difficult for the potheads and they will move elsewhere.
Now you know why these folks want to defund the police
Exactly Willem,
Stop just blowing money “Rinsing and Repeating” these programs that clearly are not working. These people doing this are laundering money through “programs” just as bad as the drug dealers are.. same game different bag.
They need to solve this by not creating addicts in the first place.
This country needs to be cleaned up so that things are not so bad that people are self medicating to cope then dying. The level of addiction should be a giant red flag as to how broken things are now. We are a failed state.
Then lets stop *ALLOWING* them to flood the country with drugs, they are ALL getting rich doing this to us.. we are essentially under attack by our own government that is doing this to us. Has anyone looked at the numbers of people that we are losing to drugs? look at their ages. Add that to the number of abortions we are allowing. We’re extincting ourselves!!
Then lets clean all these dealers up off the streets with big raids like this.
AND lets lean on states like Massachusetts where these drugs are pouring like a river from and into Vermont and New Hampshire in >>What is an underground welfare system for illegals that are the dealers *to suppress the numbers of illegals here by keeping them off the programs**<<<
Do they think we don't know what is going on??
Vermont is easy pickin’s for those from out of state.
They know they can deal drugs in this state unfettered. Every town knows where the drug dealers live. All the cops know what is going on. We can’t have people stop at many rest areas because there are too many hypodermic needles on the ground. Road crews pick up multiple 5 gallon buckets of needles because the use is so prevalent. Vermont wants to pay minorities money to deal drugs in our state, MJ< but drugs non the less. Do you think they might branch out?
Mean while people pride themselves in balancing a budget with an extra billion dollars to play with.
Does Vermont still rank among the highest states for addicted births? Everyday a baby is born in Vermont addicted to hard core drugs.
What do you think the human cost of that is? The social costs of being raised in that house hold?
Congratulation to the Burlington P.D. Well done.
Defund the criminals.
Make go through Vermonts permit process! That will stop drug dealing immediately!
Congratulation to the Burlington Police for protecting its citizens from this cancer !!
The Burlington’s gaggle of fools “AKA ” City Council wants to reduce the city’s police force
because don’t like the police because of a liberal agenda and don’t have a clue of what’s
involved in daily policing, all they know is bike paths and corner flower pots ….. there a joke !!
Burlingtonians, the real citizens of the city, not the transplants that are here for a handout from
the City tit ……… Burlington “The Queen City ” is now a homeless shelter for all.
Homeowners should be appalled at the direction of the city, but keep paying your property taxes
on your over appraised properties and watch the city spend on pet projects and don’t expect any
streets being paved, but you’ll get new bike lanes …….. what a shame!
BURLINGTON POLICE DEPARTMENT, we do support your work and dedication !!
It’s particularly satisfying when some typical gansta culture-like behavior like a beating on a girlfriend brings attention to some major drug trafficking activity. We can only hope that the Feds will completely take over the bail allowance and prosecution of this case, especially since it involves felons with guns, and can therefore warrant significant federal incarceration time. Chittenden County State’s Attorney Sarah George would just find excuses to let the perps off, citing their “rough upbringing”.