After a man allegedly called 911 and hung up, unhappy that the two passengers in his car had a hefty amount of cannabis on hand, all three New York men are now behind bars. Bedford, Pennsylvania police responded to the call and found 83 pounds of cannabis, which the men were reportedly trying to hide behind a dumpster, WTAJ reports.
The call came from the Marathon gas station on Lincoln Highway in Breezewood on January 13. The man who called 911, later named as 30-year-old Sauiqi Wang of Flushing, New York, said the people in his car had cannabis and he wanted them out, but they refused. Once the police arrived, troopers said that the other two men, 29-year-old Jiaming Yang and 29-year-old Dehuo Yu, also of Flushing, were seen standing with duffel bags in the gas station parking lot.
Police said that two of the men appeared to be attempting to hide their stash behind a dumpster at the gas station when they were caught, reportedly standing near duffle bags in the parking lot as police arrived on the scene. The men gave troopers permission to search the bag, and officers discovered cannabis in vacuum-sealed bags, though the amount was not specified. There were also five trash bags hidden behind a dumpster.
The latter was said to have contained about 83 pounds of cannabis, with an estimated street value of more than $300,000, according to the WTAJ report.
The driver, Yang, was contacted and agreed to meet with troopers, though police said they received conflicting stories from all three men, prompting a search warrant for the vehicle. Police also found roughly $120,000 in counterfeit money in duffle bags, and Yang was charged with forgery and possession with intent to deliver. Yu and Wang were charged with possession with intent to deliver.
The story may raise some eyebrows, though the details aren’t necessarily unheard of.
Maryland State Police arrested a Connecticut man in 2016 after reportedly finding trash bags in his car with 123 pounds of cannabis inside, valued at $620,000, WJLA reports. In 2021, a man in Albany, New York similarly called 911 to report a home robbery, though he neglected to get rid of the 50 pounds of cannabis in his home. The suspects had already fled by the time police arrived, and while they continued to carry out the probe, police then discovered a hefty amount of illicit cannabis.
Even in legal states, cannabis possession to this degree is criminalized. Though many of its neighboring states have recently introduced cannabis reform and are ushering in new eras of legal cannabis, recreational cannabis remains illegal in Pennsylvania. However, the cities of Pittsburgh and Philadelphia have decriminalized cannabis possession of less than one ounce.
While surrounding states are making progress, Cynthia Greer of The Philadelphia Inquirer writes that the path to cannabis legalization in Pennsylvania is “still quite long.”
“The rapidly shifting attitudes nationally have created a situation in which Pennsylvania begins to stand out for having no level of legalization, decriminalization, or regulation,” Greer writes.
Some experts believe it’s possible that cannabis will be legalized in the state this year; State legislators in the House of Senate would need to pass a bill, which the governor would then sign into law, or cannabis legalization could be added to the ballot for voters in the state to decide upon
Should the latter happen, recent polling shows that Pennsylvania residents are mostly in favor of legal cannabis. A 2021 Franklin & Marshall College poll found that six out of 10 registered voters wanted cannabis legalized. Another CBS Philadelphia poll conducted in 2022 similarly found that 66% of registered voters within the state were in favor of legalizing recreational cannabis.
