To hear the FBI tell it, the drug ring agents busted in Northern Virginia in late May was nothing short of a family affair.
FBI agents arrested a couple and their son for allegedly selling oxycodone pills out of their house in Fauquier County, according to court documents. Vernon and Helen Carter and their son, Jason, were arrested after a three-year FBI investigation, and agents said in an affidavit that the Carters had been selling pills since at least 2009. All three are currently awaiting an indictment in federal court.
According to the affidavit, Vernon and Helen Carter obtained oxycodone prescriptions from their doctor, referred to only as “Doctor A.T.” in court documents. The couple wasn’t addicted to pills — and they only took oxycodone before doctor’s appointments in case “Doctor A.T.” asked for a urine sample to prove they were taking the pills themselves, according to the affidavit. The Carters sold prescription pills from their home and bought pills from outside parties to resell to customers, according to court documents. The couple’s son, Jason, dealt drugs as well, at one point recommending that an FBI informant seek out his father to buy more oxycodone, according to court documents.
The couple, according to FBI informants cited in court documents, was afraid their home would be raided and went to great lengths to conceal their drug-dealing business, hiding pills in broken-down cars on their property and burying bottles in their lawn. They told an FBI informant to be careful leaving their house in February 2012, according to court documents.”I’m just telling you, when you pull out of here you better watch it,” Vernon Carter told the informant, according to court documents. “If you get pulled over comin’ out of here, they gonna know where they come from … right from this [expletive] house.”
Oxycodone sells on the street for about $1 per milligram, according to the affidavit. FBI agents did not indicate in their affidavit how much the Carters made in their alleged drug-dealing operation. An attorney for Helen Carter did not return a call by press time Thursday, and the Carters’ home phone has been disconnected.
