Willie James Powell, 19, and Candice Laneae Harris, 18, were arrested by members of the Albany-Dougherty SWAT team Monday after their home at the intersection of Rood and Mitchell streets was raided, District Attorney Investigator Jason Armstrong said.
Working with the Albany-Dougherty Drug Unit and other police agencies, Armstrong said, investigators learned from neighborhood residents of possible drug sales being conducted at the home and used a SWAT team to serve the warrant.
Powell is charged with possession of marijuana with intent to distribute, possession of firearm by a person under 21, possession of a firearm during commission of a felony, tampering with evidence and two counts of reckless conduct.
Harris is charged with two counts of reckless conduct after SWAT team members found two barely-clothed infants in the home, Armstrong said.
“When the SWAT team entered, the children were in the same room as the drugs and the guns and they’re selling drugs in front of the children,” he said.
“Members of the SWAT team actually had to get a blanket or coat to wrap around one the children because they had no clothes, and then we had to change that because it reeked of marijuana,” he said.
Department of Family and Children’s Services were notified and took immediate custody of the children, but they were later released to the children’s grandmother, Armstrong said.
By Tuesday afternoon, Harris had been released from the Dougherty County Jail on a $2,000 bond. Powell was denied bond at his hearing Tuesday morning, investigators say.
Inside the home, investigators found baggies of marijuana pre-packaged for individual sale, a shotgun and 9 mm handgun, Armstrong said.
Officers also found what Armstrong believes to be street gang photos and writings that investigators say link Powell to the Rood Street Gangsters. That material will undergo more scrutiny and may be presented to a grand jury for possible indictment under Georgia’s anti-gang statutes.
The raid, which Armstrong says won’t be the last, comes as investigators begin what they call a crackdown on drug dealing and other illicit crime in the neighborhood.
“We have other information about other houses in that neighborhood,” he said. “The citizens in that area have complained about drugs and prostitution and we feel that is just the tip of the iceberg of what we’re going to start doing in that neighborhood. Their complaints haven’t fallen on deaf ears.”
