It’s no secret that illegal drug use has been rising in Montana or that the drugs are often trafficked here from out of state. Early Monday morning, January 24, Lake County Sheriff Don Bell’s deputies encountered two separate drug busts, the first involved a drug task force sting, in which law enforcement discovered over a dozen grams of black tar heroin. The second drug bust resulted from a traffic accident.

"A vehicle slid into a ditch, and the deputy making contact with the occupant had, through his training, certain tell-tales about drug trafficking," said Bell. "We ended up getting a search warrant through having a drug dog run around the vehicle and we found a little over a pound of meth and over a pound and a half of marijuana was found in the vehicle."

Interestingly, the suspects in both arrests aren’t from Montana.

"19-year-old Leonardo Perez from Pascal, Washington was the suspect with the meth and marijuana and the other suspect is Michael Robinson, from California, he is 38-years-old," Bell said.

Because of the amount of drugs and other circumstances both men are facing drug distribution charges.

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