Cops net three guns over the weekend

All three arrests on South Side

YOUNGSTOWN

Police seized three handguns over the weekend on the South Side.

About 1:13 a.m. Saturday, police working a Violence Interruption Patrol pulled over a car on East Indianola Avenue that had no license plate light. When they walked up to the car to talk to the driver, they smelled a strong odor of marijuana from the car.

The driver, Deshawnn L. Williams, 24, of East Ravenwood Avenue, appeared nervous and was asked to step out of the car, reports said. When she was searched officers found a .32-caliber pistol in her waistband.

Found in her pockets were 104 pills and four bags of marijuana, reports said. She also had cough syrup inside her bra prescribed to another person.

She was taken to the Mahoning County jail for the charges of possession of dangerous drugs, carrying a concealed weapon and possession of drugs, marijuana.

Later that morning, officers Mike Quinn and Anthony Congemi pulled over a car in front of a home in the 300 block of East Indianola Avenue for failure to use its turn signal properly. The driver, later identified as Vernon W. Johnson, 19, of Pointview Avenue, ran away through several back yards.

Johnson continued running with Congemi chasing him across East Florida, Marmion and Cornell avenues as Johnson climbed over a fence until he was caught in a wooded area behind a 357 Cornell Ave. home.

Police backtracked the area where Johnson ran and found in back yards and 361 and 365 Marmion two large bags of marijuana, two large bags of suspected crack cocaine and a .38-caliber revolver loaded with five rounds. Some pills were found in the car and $1,690 in cash was found in the pockets of his pants.

Johnson was arrested on the charges of carrying a concealed weapon, possession of dangerous drugs, possession of marijuana, driving under suspension and failure to comply as well as several traffic charges.

Quinn and Congemi found another gun during another South Side traffic early Sunday morning, when they found a .45-caliber semiautomatic handgun in a car driven by John T. Payne Jr., 42. of Waldo Street in New Castle, Pa.

Payne was arrested on charges of improper handling a firearm in a motor vehicle and having weapons despite a previous felony conviction that prevents him from having a handgun. He was pulled over at Mabel and Gibson avenues about 12:25 a.m. Saturday for having only one working headlight.

Officers saw the butt end of a handgun sticking out from underneath the driver’s seat, reports said. Reports said Payne told police he was on his way to a meeting of a motorcycle club and if he did not make it he would lose one of his membership patches. He was taken instead to the county jail.