LAWRENCE, Mass. (WSVN) – A boy called police after finding drugs stashed in his father’s suitcase, telling police, “I think my dad sells drugs.”
Police said the 11-year-old boy found 212 grams of heroin and fentanyl in his 40-year-old father’s belongings, prompting a phone call to the city’s police department.
After obtaining an arrest warrant, officers searched the man’s luggage and found the drugs packed in multiple plastic bags, as well as several other empty bags, authorities said.
The suspect’s son told police that he had seen him conducting a drug deal earlier in the day. Officers estimated the drugs to be worth about $8,500.
“I commend this young man for being brave enough to come forward and report that these dangerous substances were in his home,” Lawrence Police Chief James Fitzpatrick said. “It is frightening to consider that the drugs the boy found are strong enough to cause serious harm to full grown adults, merely by being in their presence, and to consider what could have happened had he not immediately called for help from law enforcement.”
The father, Yamil Mercado, 41, turned himself into police. He is charged with heroin trafficking and reckless endangerment of a child.
In court Friday, prosecutors told the judge that the boy knew his father had a history of selling drugs.
The boy is now in the care of family members. The Department of Children and Families is also investigating.
Mercado was ordered held without bail pending a hearing.
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