Two days before a man died of a drug overdose at Rotary Viewpoint Park, another man was arrested for alleged drug dealing there, and has been in jail ever since. SPD’s weekend summaries, released today, included a brief mention of this arrest just after 2 pm Saturday, saying it started when officers “were conducting a premise (check) in an area known for the sale and use of illegal narcotics.” Probable-cause documents identified the area as the park at 35th/Alaska. The officer who wrote the report began by explaining that he’s usually on proactive crime-prevention detail and added: “Prior to today’s incident, I have personally been a part of numerous narcotics-related contacts and arrests in the immediate vicinity. Many within the park at the above intersection …”
He and another officer watched the park from a marked patrol car parked nearby, he wrote. They arrested the 49-year-old suspect after seeing him sit down on a bench and smoke with others from “a large device (that) later field tested presumptive positive for having fentanyl residue …” They also said they saw the suspect approached by “multiple people,” one of whom they saw “giving him a significant wad of cash” in exchange for a piece of foil that man was later seen using to smoke. The officers said they watched a few more exchanges before moving in on the suspect, who they say responded by attempting to flee; they say they later found “multiple knives” in his possession, a well as “several separate bags of what he admitted was methamphetamine” plus $94 and 2 Euro in cash and various items of “narcotics paraphernalia.” They also discovered he had a $5,000 warrant for failing to appear in a stolen-car case filed in early 2024. We haven’t looked up his full record yet but court files show the warrant was issued last June, and that he had a previous stolen-car case on his record almost a decade ago, resolved in a plea bargain.