BERKELEY \u2014 Things were already going poorly for a local resident suspected of selling MDMA and other drugs from his apartment \u2014 the cops had been called there for a report of a woman being held hostage, and found the suspect blocking the doorway with suspected drugs in a bag on a table behind him.<\/p>\n
But as police were searching the home \u2014 where they\u2019d allegedly find more than 32 pounds of marijuana, 1.5 ounces of MDMA, and a half-ounce of cocaine \u2014 things got even worse for the 37-year-old Berkeley man. A text popped up from \u201cBig Ricky\u201d on his phone, which at this point was in police possession, according to court records.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou still want a kilo?\u201d it allegedly read.<\/p>\n
Now the man has been charged with felony counts of selling controlled substances and misdemeanor charges of battery, resisting arrest, and being a marijuana dealer. He has been released from jail while the case is pending and is next due in court on May 15 for a preliminary hearing, records show.<\/p>\n
The charges stem from a March 21 police call, where a woman claimed her friend was being held hostage by a man on the 1200 block of Ashby Avenue in Berkeley. Police responded and found the 37-year-old man \u2014 the victim\u2019s boyfriend \u2014 blocking the doorway. Police said in court records he \u201crefused to comply with Officer\u2019s commands and continued to block access to the victim,\u201d who remained inside.<\/p>\n
Police handcuffed him, located the woman inside, and began searching the home after an officer noted a \u201cwhite powdery substance\u201d on a table inside. The suspected drugs were found, along with, \u201cshipping material, a ledger sheet, vacuum sealable packaging material, vacuum sealers, and narcotics,\u201d police said in court records. Then the text from \u201cBig Ricky\u201d came in.<\/p>\n
The man has pleaded not guilty.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"BERKELEY \u2014 Things were already going poorly for a local resident suspected of selling MDMA and other drugs…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":302800,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[127815,127817,23791,127816,143,145,144],"class_list":["post-302799","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-oakland","tag-berkeley-drug-dealer","tag-berkeley-fight","tag-berkeley-police","tag-berkeley-raid","tag-oakland","tag-oakland-headlines","tag-oakland-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/302799","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=302799"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/302799\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/302800"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=302799"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=302799"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=302799"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}