A Bristol man faces a felony drug-trafficking charge after law enforcement allegedly seized a large quantity of marijuana, as well as cocaine and firearms, from his home Friday, Sept. 19.
The Lincoln County Sheriff’s Office and the Maine Drug Enforcement Agency executed a search warrant at the home of Jeff Templeton, 60, after an investigation into a marijuana grow on his property.
“Agents seized 16 very healthy, mature (marijuana) plants growing outside, about 5 pounds of processed marijuana bagged up for resale, about 1 gram of cocaine, scales, drug paraphernalia, a shotgun, a rifle, a handgun, and an ATV that was being used to tend the marijuana plants,” MDEA Special Agent James Pease said in a press release.
A pound of “homegrown” marijuana can fetch $2,500-$3,500, James Pease said. The plants would each yield about a half-pound to a pound of marijuana. Thus, the total street value of the marijuana and plants would be between $32,500 and $73,500.
Templeton was issued a summons for a single charge of class C trafficking marijuana, a felony punishable by up to five years in prison and a $5,000 fine. The state will pursue additional charges, according to the press release.
Templeton, reached by phone Sept. 22, acknowledged some of the allegations as true and denied others.
“Yeah, I had a few plants out back,” Templeton said. The rest of the plants were on someone else’s property and he does not know who they belong to, he said.
Templeton disputed the amount of processed marijuana seized. “There wasn’t 5 pounds of processed marijuana up there,” he said.
“They found a line of coke on a little glass plate,” Templeton said. He said it weighed about a quarter of a gram.
“The search warrant has a lot of discrepancies,” Templeton said. He called it “bogus.”
Templeton also objected to law enforcement “harassing” him for a “few plants” at a time when methamphetamine use is on the rise and marijuana is “near legal.”
“I think things are out of whack,” Templeton said.
Templeton encouraged The Lincoln County News to contact Jason Pease, an MDEA agent present during the search, but the agent confirmed most of the information in the press release.
The cocaine was just short of a gram, at about seven-tenths of a gram, Jason Pease said.
Templeton acknowledged “ownership” of all 16 plants, whether on his property or not, Jason Pease said.
Templeton told agents he was going to throw away some of the processed marijuana, Jason Pease said, but it does not matter for legal purposes. “It’s still 5 pounds of marijuana,” he said.
