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Martin Alvarado Jr., 33, most recently of Lancaster, PA, previously Las Cruces, NM, was on probation after a negotiated guilty plea in 2022 for Intentional Possession of a Controlled Substance by a Person Not Registered for a Lancaster offense at the time when the items were found in a storage unit in his name in the 1500 block of Cloister Drive, Lancaster by the Drug Task Force and East Hempfield Police with a K-9 sniff on May 18, 2023, according to a release the following month.
The federal government's Drug Enforcement Administration had sent a tip to the local Drug Task Force, which conducted the warranted search of the unit, where officers found 985.5 fentanyl pills (street valued at $29,000), drug paraphernalia, and a Savage .22-caliber rifle were found, the DA's release detailed.
Alvarado confessed to possessing the drugs and gun, and he also gave consent to have his home and phone searched, according to the DA.
That's how agents from the Lancaster County Digital Forensics Unit were able to discover that Alvarado’s phone contained "hundreds of videos and photos depicting child pornography," the DA said.
Alvarado is prohibited from possessing a firearm due to his prior convictions, according to the DA. In addition to the local offense in 2022, he was convicted of a felony distribution of marijuana charge in New Mexico in 2012 and "transporting, bringing in and harboring, and smuggling aliens in 2014" a charge brought forth by the United States Custom and Border Patrol, as explained in the release. He entered guilty pleas in both cases, according to court documents obtained by Daily Voice.
He was arrested on May 30 and has been charged with intent to manufacture or deliver drugs, possession of a firearm, child pornography, and criminal use of a communication facility, the DA said and court records confirm.
He has been held in the Lancaster County Prison on $500,000 bail and his preliminary hearing has been set before Magisterial District Judge Brian E. Chudzik at 1:30 p.m. on June 9, according to his latest court docket.
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