Ron Welch
Muskingum County Prosecutor
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Tuesday, August 16, 2022
Drug dealer faces nearly 20 years in prison for possessing drugs, weapons
A local drug dealer faces a maximum of nearly 20 years in prison after changing his plea in common pleas court Monday.
Samuel Dejesus, 22, pleaded guilty to one first-degree felony count of possession of a fentanyl-related substance with a forfeiture specification and one third-degree felony count of having a weapon under disability, which derives from Dejesus’ previous burglary conviction in 2019.
His latest case, handled by special prosecutor David DeVillers due to a conflict of interest, opened in February after the Muskingum County Sheriff’s Office received a complaint of possible drug trafficking occurring at Dejesus’ house on Florence Avenue in Zanesville.
According to the investigation, law enforcement surveilled the house and made a traffic stop on a car leaving the residence. A K9 officer alerted on the vehicle for possible drugs, prompting officers to search the car. Inside, deputies recovered $3,700 from the female driver’s purse. She stated that Dejesus handed her the money when they were pulled over.
At the same time, deputies who remained at the Florence Avenue house watched a woman enter the house, remove a bag containing approximately 500 gram of marijuana and hide it in the adjacent woods.
After securing the property and obtaining a search warrant, deputies found around eight kilograms of marijuana, 600 grams of hashish oil, a loaded 9 mm luger on the defendant’s bed, a bulletproof vest, numerous blenders, a money counter, $223.11 in cash, a loaded 12-gauge shotgun under the couch and approximately 237 grams of fentanyl located in a book bag.
Investigators learned that Dejesus was selling marijuana and hashish oil, and he knowingly possessed the firearms found in his house. However, the book bag containing fentanyl also contained an item of clothing which tested positive for another person’s DNA. Law enforcement learned that the defendant was aware of the fentanyl inside the backpack, which Dejesus was holding for another drug dealer. The other drug dealer stayed in Dejesus’ house a couple weeks prior to the search warrant. According to the investigation, Dejesus did not intend to sell the fentanyl or to distribute it to customers.
When sentenced at a later date, Dejesus faces up to three years in prison for the weapon under disability charge, and up to 11 to 16-and-a-half years for the drug possession charge.
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