THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Tuesday, April 16, 1996 TAG: 9604160346
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B3 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY KAREN JOLLY DAVIS AND LARRY W. BROWN, STAFF WRITERS
LENGTH: Medium: 68 lines
Police seized 8.8 pounds of cocaine headed for the Hampton Roads drug market in two busts within a week on Route 13 on Virginia's Eastern Shore.
In the most recent seizure, on Sunday, Trooper W.W. Talbert found a 2.2-pound brick of cocaine valued at $100,000 while searching a Ford Escort he stopped a mile south of Accomac because it didn't have brake lights.
Last Wednesday, agents of the Drug Enforcement Agency, assisted by members of the Eastern Shore Drug Task Force, found 6.6 pounds of cocaine in a car in Northampton County. It was valued by police at $300,000.
Talbert said Monday the cocaine seized Sunday was tightly wrapped in newspaper and duct tape, and was in a suitcase in the trunk of the Escort.
Talbert, who was joined by two other troopers, said the driver, 27-year-old Robert Orellanes of Queens, N.Y., was asked what was in the package.
Orellanes looked at the ground and said ``drugs,'' Talbert said. ``He came right out and told us, in the end.''
Tammy Van Dame, a state police spokeswoman, said Talbert was on ``selective speed enforcement'' for the department's Safe and Sober program. The campaign, which began last weekend, is designed to educate and crack down on drunken driving, speeding and seat-belt violations.
Talbert said he stopped the southbound car at 2:45 p.m., and asked Orellanes where he was going.
Orellanes said he was bound for Virginia Beach to meet a girl. But he didn't have a telephone number or address of the girl, or any way to contact her, Talbert said. Then the trooper noticed a small yellow note in Orellanes' wallet with directions to Hampton.
``Things started seeming kinda fishy,'' Talbert said.
The trooper asked Orellanes if he could search the car. The driver gave him permission, Talbert said.
The trooper said he found two spare tires, a new laptop computer, a cellular phone, camera and a suitcase. He found the package of cocaine in the suitcase, with some clothes and a manual for the computer.
That's when the police asked Orellanes what was in the package, and he admitted it was cocaine, Talbert said.
The New Yorker was charged with felony possession with intent to distribute cocaine.
Orellanes was scheduled to appear Wednesday in U.S. District Court in Norfolk. Officials said he would be held in the Portsmouth City Jail.
In the DEA seizure, a 69-year-old Philadelphia man, John Elwood Mapp, was stopped at 1:20 a.m. just north of the Chesapeake Bay Bridge-Tunnel. Agents said they found three packages of cocaine under the rear seat of Mapp's 1993 Pontiac.
Later that day, Exmore residents Angelo Bernard Jones, 25, and James Henry Edwards, 37, were arrested in the Shore Plaza shopping center parking lot in Exmore in connection with the bust. All three were arraigned last Thursday in U.S. District Court in Norfolk. They were charged with conspiracy to possess cocaine with intent to distribute.
Bruce Jones, commonwealth's attorney for Northampton County, said the seizure near the bridge-tunnel probably was the largest ever on the Eastern Shore.
Livia Cole, agent in charge of the Norfolk DEA office, said Route 13 is favored by drug traffickers traveling south because it is not as congested as Interstate 95.
As a result, she said, state police monitor the highway heavily.
KEYWORDS: ARREST COCAINE DRUGS ILLEGAL by CNB