May 18—Two people are in the Morgan County Jail in lieu of a $500,300 bond each after a raid at a West Chapel Hill Road house resulted in the seizure of a pound of fentanyl-laced methamphetamine, according to Decatur police.
Tyler Maurice Moore, 30, of 3513 W. Chapel Hill Road, and Emily Angela McCullough, 26, of Antioch Road in Somerville, both face charges of trafficking in illegal drugs and unlawful possession of drug paraphernalia.
Investigators with the Decatur Police Department’s Vice/Narcotics Unit this month received complaints of illegal narcotics sales in the 3500 block of West Chapel Hill Road and an investigation led to the identification of Moore as the primary suspect, according to police.
On Tuesday, investigators executed a search warrant at Moore’s residence. In addition to Moore and McCullough, they arrested Maurice White Moore Jr., 57, also a resident of 3515 W. Chapel Hill Road, and charged him with possession of a controlled substance and drug paraphernalia. He is being held in the Morgan County Jail in lieu of a $1,300 bond.
Three other people at the residence were charged with loitering in a drug house, a misdemeanor.
Tyler Moore, McCullough and Maurice Moore all had prior drug arrests.
In February 2020, Tyler Moore was charged with leaving the scene of an accident at Cedar Lake Road and U.S. 31. The arresting officer said Moore ran from his wrecked vehicle and, when located, he was holding something under his hoodie. After initially refusing commands to get on the ground, according to a police report, Moore admitted that he was trying to conceal methamphetamine.
The charges arising from the incident were dismissed as part of a guilty plea on an obstruction of justice charge that had been filed the previous year when Tyler Moore presented a false identification to a police officer in an effort, according to police, to avoid pending felony warrants. Moore was sentenced to 10 years in that case as a habitual offender, but court records indicate he was granted parole.
McCullough was sentenced to 30 months of probation in February after pleading guilty to possession of a controlled substance and possession of a forged instrument. According to the arrest report, a Morgan County sheriff’s deputy stopped a vehicle with an improper tag. McCullough, a passenger in the car, hid a gum wrapper with two rocks of heroin in her bra, according to the deputy.
Maurice Moore was charged with possession of methamphetamine in Lawrence County in September and was released on a $1,000 bond. In 2019, he pleaded guilty in Morgan County to possession of a controlled substance and was sentenced to 24 months of probation.
— eric@decaturdaily.com or 256-340-2435. Twitter @DD_Fleischauer.