A Carter County man and woman now face drug charges after police say an anonymous tip led them to a meth lab at the man’s home late Wednesday night.
Police arrested Billy Wayne Napier, 23, of 149 Lovers Lane, Elizabethton, and Mary Ann Reed (also known as Mary Fraley), 23, of 135 Ruby Avenue, Elizabethton, and charged the pair with initiation of the process to manufacture methamphetamine.
Around 11:30 p.m. Wednesday, Carter County Sheriff’s Department Investigator Myles Cook was called to the home on Lovers Lane after CCDS Lt. Kenny Cornett and Constable Tim Lyons located what they believed to be a meth lab in an outbuilding on the property after receiving an anonymous tip meth was being cooked at the home.
When the officers arrived, they could smell a strange odor coming from the outbuilding and heard people inside talking, Cook said, adding Cornett then knocked on the door to the outbuilding.
“When Mr. Napier opened the door to the outbuilding, Lt. Cornett witnessed a black male throw a large plastic bottle under a couch in the outbuilding,” Cook said, adding Cornett was able to identify the man as Korane Quatez Moore and attempted to detain him. “When Lt. Cornett attempted to place handcuffs on Mr. Moore, (he) resisted and was able to flee the scene on foot with one handcuff attached to his hand.”
Officers were able to detain Napier and a third occupant of the outbuilding, later identified as Reed.
After searching the building, Cornett located the active meth lab as well as numerous items used to produce methamphetamine and contacted Cook to respond to the scene.
Both Napier and Reed were decontaminated by the Carter County Rescue Squad and then transported to the Carter County Detention Center. The pair remain there under $3,500 bond each and are scheduled to appear in Court on June 9. No arraignment date has been set for either Napier or Reed at this time.
Charges against Moore in connection with the meth lab and fleeing the scene are pending at this time, Cook said.
This is the second time this year Reed has been arrested on drug related charges.
In April she was arrested on charges of maintaining a dwelling where narcotics are manufactured or sold, possession of drug paraphernalia and simple possession of drugs. Reed was bound over to a Grand Jury, which handed an indictment on those charges on May 8.
In that case, officers went to Reed’s home on Ruby Avenue after receiving a tip that drugs were being manufactured there.