Crime & Safety

Ohio Man Chased into Bernards Had More Than Pound of Heroin, Court Says

Man indicted in Superior County Wednesday on charges of buying heroin in NYC with intent to bring home and resell.

By Mike Deak

Leonard King was on his way back home to Steubenville, Ohio, on June 4 when he was stopped by a state trooper on Route 78 in Bridgewater, starting a police chase that ended in Bernards Township before his arrest for allegedly carrying more than a pound of heroin, court papers say. 

King allegedly had just bought more than a pound of heroin in New York City for $26,000 and was going home to sell it for $120,000, he later told police, according to an affidavit filed in state Superior Court.

Instead, King led police on a circular chase that ended in Bernards and, eventually, the Somerset County Jail, the affidavit said.

King, 39, who remains in the jail in lieu of $250,000 bail, was indicted on Wednesday on a charge of first-degree possession of heroin with intent to distribute, eluding police and resisting arrest.

According to an affidavit filed in Superior Court, a state trooper stopped a white Oldsmobile with temporary Ohio places on westbound Route 78 in Bridgewater. As the trooper approached the car, the driver, later identified as King, sped off, leading the trooper on a chase onto northbound Route 287, the affidavit said.

After the trooper terminated the pursuit, he continued his patrol of the interstate highways, the affidavit said. That’s when he later spotted the white Oldsmobile on southbound Route 287 and started another pursuit that went onto westbound Route 78.

But the trooper, on instructions from the Perryville barracks for NJ state police, ended that pursuit as well.

Later, Bernards police found the white Oldsmobile abandoned off Route 78 at King George Road with its doors and trunk open, the affidavit said.

State troopers and other officers then converged on the area and found King and a passenger in the car, who King said was not involved with the heroin, the affidavit said.

After he was arrested, King told police that he was hoping to sell the 690 grams of heroin in Steubenville, according to the affidavit.


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