They also obtained a fugitive warrant for a recently-paroled convicted killer who they said was running a drug operation from his apartment.
Investigators targeted an open-air drug market at the corner of Godwin Avenue and Auburn Street following several complaints, city Public Safety Director Jerry Speziale said.
After seizing 11 buyers and three dealers – including one 16 and the other 17 – city Narcotics Division detectives got search warrants for an apartment around the corner on Hamilton Street and a car stopped on nearby Rosa Parks Boulevard, the director said.
The driver, Trayvon R. Sparks, 31, was arrested after 250 heroin folds and 26 vials of crack were found, Speziale said.
Seized from the apartment were 98 crack vials, a .22-caliber handgun and drug packaging materials.
Missing was apartment tenant Justin Dennison, 32, who was released from state prison last November after serving a little over 5½ years of a 10-year sentence for the January 2012 shooting death of 25-year-old Dashon Adamson, who was killed along with 22-year-old Taheem Taylor.
Dennison faces dozens of charges involving the possession and sale of heroin and crack, as well as weapons possession by a convicted felon, possession of hollow-point ammo and maintaining a drug production facility.
Of those taken into custody, Nascir Robertson, 22, and the two teens were each charged with dozens of offenses that included:
- drug possession and sale;
- weapons possession;
- possession of hollow-point ammo;
- maintaining a drug production facility.
Sparks, meanwhile, was charged with possession with the intent to sell heroin and crack, as were city residents George M. Love, 40, and Anthony Demarco, 25, and two Gardner, NC residents: Joseph R. Abruzese, 33, and Brianna Ecehm, 23.
Busted buyers included four women: one, 27, from Paterson, two from Clifton -- one 45 and the other 35 – and one, 25, from Oak Ridge, NJ.
Also arrested on possession charges were a 37-year-old Lake Hiawatha man; a 35-year-old Wayne man and a 56-year-old Paterson woman.
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