Local man accused of trying to sell cocaine to employees at Burger King

Published 9:33 am Wednesday, June 17, 2015

Would you like some cocaine with that?

That is not a new menu offering at one of the city’s fast food restaurants, but instead what employees at the restaurant told police a customer was trying to sell to them.

Elizabethton Police Department officers were dispatched to Burger King on West Elk Avenue shortly after 10 p.m. Monday. Employees there told EPD Cpl. Sarah Ellison that a man in a blue Ford F-150 had tried to sell them cocaine.

Subscribe to our free email newsletter

Get the latest news sent to your inbox

The truck had left the restaurant before police arrived, but a few minutes later, the truck was spotted unoccupied at Wal-Mart. A passerby at the store told Ellison the man who had gotten out of the truck was Jeffrey Greene.

Ellison then found Greene, 52, 635 Long Hollow Road, in the parking lot. Ellison asked him whether he was a passenger in the blue F-150, and Greene said he had been. While talking with Greene, Ellison asked if she could pat him down for officer safety. Greene consented to the search, Ellison said. She then found a prescription bottle for Suboxone in his pocket. Inside the bottle was one Suboxone pill and one Vicodin pill.

EPD Patrol Officer James Holland noted Green had bloodshot eyes and slurred speech and smelled of alcohol.

Holland asked Greene to take some sobriety tests, but Greene allegedly told Holland he “could not do the tests” and admitted to drinking an alcoholic beverage. Holland then placed Greene under arrest for public intoxication.

While Holland was administering the sobriety tests to Greene, Ellison spoke with the driver of the truck and asked him whether there was anything illegal inside. He then showed her the middle console, where she found a white, rocklike substance, which tested positive for cocaine and weighed around 1 gram.

Greene was additionally charged with simple possession of Schedule II drugs.

He is scheduled to appear in General Sessions Court July 28.