By BOB HIGH
At least 40 shots were fired early Friday morning in the dark of night on Chadbourn’s southwest side, and an arrest that afternoon produced a vehicle trunk loaded with five loaded weapons and 60 packets of drugs ready to be sold.
“We’re happy to get these guns off the streets, but there are many more. We were extremely lucky Friday morning that no one, including two of our officers, didn’t get hit by all the bullets,” Chief of Police Steven Shaw commented.
Called at 2 p.m. Friday to the same area along South Wilkes Street where all the shooting took place 11 hours earlier, police stopped a suspicious vehicle and the driver allowed a search of the car.
Detective Deon Hayes found in the trunk a loaded semiautomatic AK-47 with a banana clip, a loaded 12-gauge shotgun, and three loaded pistols – a Glock 9 mm with two full clips, another 9 mm, and a .38-caliber revolver.
A small sport bag produced three masks, two rolls of duct tape, a flashlight and gloves. Two small metal cans – containers used for breath mints known as Altoids – were crammed with packets of crack cocaine. A small plastic bag was also found and contained 23 small packets of marijuana. All of the drugs were found in the vehicle’s glove compartment.
The driver of the car – Santonia Thurman Jenrette, 19, of Stanley Circle in the Brunswick-Whiteville community, was charged with possession of cocaine and marijuana for the purpose of sale. Emmanuel Debaris Jones, 17, of Lake View Drive, Whiteville, was charged with possession of marijuana for sale.
More charges
Hayes said he expected to bring more charges this week involving the weapons found in Jenrette’s car.
Chadbourn officers Brian Benton and William D. Britt witnessed the shooting that began at 2:40 a.m. Friday. Benton said he “felt the air” of one bullet that whizzed past his head, and noted that no shots hit the two police cars.
Benton’s reported the following:
He was called to a report of shots being fired on Joyner Street, west of Brown Street (N.C. 410) and as he moved onto Railroad Avenue off South Brown Street he saw a dark red SUV and a dark colored car ahead of him, both stopped.
Benton heard shots, stopped his car and got a shotgun from the trunk. Shots were still being fired. Some occupants of both vehicles ahead of him got out and ran to the rear of the old Soul Food restaurant.
The vehicles moved toward Benton and he – reinforced by Britt – stopped them and ordered the occupants to get out. Four males got out of the car and were told to lie on the ground. One male came from behind the Soul Food building and was also ordered down. This male told Benton he had a “cut on his hand,” but didn’t know if it came from being hit by a bullet.
More shooting
More shots came from behind the old restaurant building and Benton and the male with the cut hand ran behind Benton’s police car. Two more men got up from the pavement and sought cover behind Benton’s car.
As the firing continued, the men ran to their vehicles and drove away.
Police from Tabor City, Fair Bluff, Whiteville, plus sheriff’s deputies and Highway Patrol troopers arrived to assist Chadbourn’s officers. Those who alerted authorities did not give a reason for the shooting.
The Friday afternoon call that took police to the same area noted that a vehicle, one matching the description of those involved early Friday, was on South Wilkes “doing doughnuts” in the street in front of the same home.
Chief Shaw said information given him showed an argument that began at the Mini Mall outside Ivey’s Café in Whiteville continued to Chadbourn.
Several incidents
The Whiteville incident was at 1:30 a.m. Friday and police report that two males were in a fight between the Time Saver convenience store here and Ivey’s Restaurant. One of them reported that a pistol “fell out of his pocket” during the fight, and another male took it.
There have been several shooting incidents in Chadbourn during the past six weeks, including one where a home and two vehicles were struck by several bullets while two males were inside the residence.
Two off-duty Chadbourn officers were called in Friday afternoon to help with crowd control, and several members of Jenrette’s family gathered at the police department after the youth’s arrest.
Several complained that police had beaten Jenrette, and Shaw took family members into the department’s interview room to see the suspect to show them he had no injuries.