State Crime and Court Roundup: Routine traffic stop turns into a major drug bust in Merrill

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MERRILL - Three people face a total of 28 criminal charges, after a routine traffic stop turned into a major drug bust in Merrill.

Police said they stopped 23-year-old Cassiopia Conlin of Merrill late Monday night, because the license plates did not match the vehicle they were on. Officials said Conlin tried giving a false name, but the officer recognized her. And she and two passengers were arrested after a large amount of drugs were found by the officer and Wausau’s canine unit. Conlin, 38-year-old Jimmie Joannon of Merrill, and 49-year-old Danny Hanson of Wausau appeared in Lincoln County Circuit Court yesterday – and all are due back December sixth when a judge will decide whether to order trials. Conlin faces nine charges, Joannon 11, and Hanson eight. They include possessing meth-amphetamines, heroin, and LSD with the intent to sell them. Other charges include maintaining a drug trafficking house, marijuana possession, using paraphernalia to manufacture drugs, bail jumping, and not having the required state drug tax stamps. Bond was set at $20,000 for Hanson, and $7,500 dollars for the other two.

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Police and sheriff’s officers in Dane County conducted their first “DNA sweep” yesterday. They were looking for 93 convicted felons and sex offenders who never provided their DNA to authorities as required by law. And they found 14 of those offenders – including one who was wanted on an outstanding warrant. About 30 officers took part in yesterday’s sweep. They included Dane County deputies, and police officers from Madison, Middleton, Fitchburg, and Sun Prairie. The state began requiring DNA samples from convicted felons in 2000 for a statewide database that’s been heavily used in investigating past-and-present crimes. Later in the decade, it was discovered that 12-thousand convicts never provided their required DNA samples – and authorities have made numerous efforts which has reduced the backlog.

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Lawyers for the Chippewa Indians and the state DNR are scheduled to meet today with Federal Judge Barbara Crabb, to discuss the status of a lawsuit which seeks to stop the tribes from deer hunting at night. The judge could set a date to hear arguments in the DNR’s lawsuit. The tribes say they want to exercise their centuries-old treaty rights to hunt-and-fish in much of northern Wisconsin – but the state says the night-time shootings will put motorists and others in danger. A Mole Lake tribal member received a night-time hunting permit from the Great Lakes Indian Fish-and-Wildlife Commission. But the agency revoked the permit yesterday, while the legal challenge proceeds. The tribal hunting was supposed to begin Monday, and the commission could not say when it might start. In 1989, Judge Crabb ruled against a similar night-time tribal hunt – and she gave the DNR the power to regulate hunting statewide. Now, the tribes said the state opened the door to night-time deer hunting, when they approved the night-time hunting of wolves for the first time this year. That argument was part of the tribes’ response filed yesterday to the state’s lawsuit. The tribes also said they need the hunt to survive, as unemployment is up to 93-percent among some bands.

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Three people have been arrested for a convenience store robbery in a small town in Manitowoc County during the Thanksgiving weekend. Sheriff Robert Hermann said officers obtained a warrant yesterday to search a home in Denmark – and officers from several agencies arrested a 28-year-old woman and two men ages 20 and 18. They’re suspected in a Saturday night robbery at the Marathon Plaza Mini-Mart in Francis Creek where cash, lottery tickets, and cigarettes were stolen. Officers from both Manitowoc and Brown counties took part in the investigation.

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