An Elizabethton man sought by police since he reportedly fled the scene of a meth lab investigation last month turned himself in to officers Monday.
Officers of the Carter County Sheriff’s Department arrested Korane Quatez Moore, 43, 509 West F. St., Elizabethton, on several outstanding warrants charging him with initiation of the process to manufacture methamphetamine, six counts of promotion of methamphetamine manufacture and resisting arrest. Moore went to the Sheriff’s Department to turn himself in Monday and was taken into custody by officers.
On May 13, CCSD Lt. Kenny Cornett and Constable Tim Lyons went to a home at 149 Lovers Lane after Lyons received an anonymous tip that meth was being cooked there.
When the officers arrived, they could smell a strange odor coming from the outbuilding and heard people inside talking, CCSD Inv. Myles Cook said, adding Cornett then knocked on the door to the outbuilding.
A man opened the door to the outbuilding and Cornett saw a black man, later identified as Moore, throw a large plastic bottle under a couch in the outbuilding.
When Cornett attempted to place Moore in handcuffs, Moore resisted the officer and ran away from the building with one handcuff still attached to his hand, Cook said.
Officers detained the man who opened the door, 23-year-old Billy Wayne Napier, of that address, as well as and Mary Ann Reed (also known as Mary Fraley), 23, of 135 Ruby Avenue, Elizabethton, and searched the outbuilding. During the search, Cornett and Lyons located an active meth lab as well as numerous items used to produce the drug and asked Cook to respond to the scene.
As a result of the lab find, officers charged Napier and Reed with initiation of the process to manufacture methamphetamine and obtained warrants for Moore’s arrest as well.
Moore appeared in Carter County General Sessions Court on Tuesday. Judge Keith Bowers appointed local attorney Jerome Cochran to represent Moore and scheduled Moore to return to court on Friday.