WILLIAMSON/SALINE COs. – A former frequent flier of the drug court system in Saline turned up in a very big way in Williamson County in March.
And while many weren’t so surprised to hear the name “Scott Way” emerge from a big-time arrest affected by the Southern Illinois Enforcement Group (SIEG) drug task force, there are those who are experiencing a pucker factor in the ensuing weeks following that arrest.
That’s because it’s being reported that Way, 35 and homeless, who’s accused by Williamson authorities to be the facilitator of importing Ecstasy from the Netherlands into a location in that county, is also being eyeballed for other drug-moving allegations…and like many in recent years in and around Williamson, the customers, it’s being said, are much higher rollers than those the likes of Natasha Mann – a co-defendant in the Williamson charges – is said to be distributing to.
Special delivery
The case broke on March 11 when Mann, 28, of Cambria north of Carterville in Williamson County, was arrested outside her house after she pulled a package out of her mailbox.
The package, as it turned out, was being tracked from the Netherlands to Chicago O’Hare International Airport, having landed there on March 8 and having been intercepted by Homeland Security.
The package contained MDMA – methylenedioxymethamphetamine – also known as Ecstasy, XTC, Molly, and other street names. A chemical compound that’s been around for well over a hundred years, it had previously been used in psychotherapy in the 1970s but has no medical use currently; instead, it became a really popular club drug in the 90s, particularly in Europe, where it came to be brought over to the states for the same purpose. It’s just under meth for hyperactivity and just above cocaine for effects; and because it can also be snorted and smoked besides ingested, it’s a fairly popular product in the part of the country that’s awash with illicit drugs, southern Illinois.
The package had already been opened and counted as regards the number of pills (415), but authorities needed a little bigger amount in order to obtain a delivery charge (600 or more). The package was enough to allow agents to have a search warrant, and after Mann was taken in on the March 11 delivery, they conducted a search of her home and found more: Over a thousand, as well as a few hundred dollars in cash, bags of cocaine and cannabis, and a digital scale with cocaine residue on it.
Lesser of two evils…or crimes, as it were
Mann told SIEG that because of her criminal history (in Williamson, it consisted only of violence, most of that dismissed), she couldn’t “gain lawful employment”; therefore her only option other than to “sell her body” was to sell drugs, with the packages being shipped to her in this manner. However, she didn’t know what was in the packages, she said, only that there was a person – whom she didn’t identify – who paid her to have the packages shipped to her place in Cambria. She said that as of that date and since before Christmas 2015, she’d had a minimum of 20 shipments made there.
On March 14, she was charged with Unlawful Possession of a Controlled Substance with Intent to Deliver (the MDMA) and Unlawful Possession with Intent to Deliver a Controlled Substance, Cocaine.
She was bonded out by a woman claiming roughly the same address as Mann, this being Teyana Hopsin (according to a scrawl on the bond sheet, at any rate; it might be Tamara) with $4,000.
And Natasha Mann was out and about on March 15, headed for a court hearing on March 21…when on March 23, something else happened.
Didn’t want kids to see her arrested
On that day, at about 3:38 p.m., she and her two minor children, under surveillance by SIEG agents, got in her car and began to leave their house – making a stop at the mailbox first.
There, naturally, she pulled four packages from the box and headed up the street.
A little ways up, she stopped in the middle of the street (probably to examine the packages).
That’s when SIEG agents decided to make their move, and pulled up to effect the arrest.
However, Mann would have none of it, and tossed out three of the four packages (two of them having previously been determined as containing MDMA) and drove her vehicle straight toward the approaching agent, Greg Chance, in his vehicle. Her car struck his, then went on eastbound down the street at a high rate of speed.
After driving around in an attempt to find the vehicle Mann and her children were in, they ultimately did, and chased her from the Colp area into the city of Marion.
Telling the authorities that she “didn’t want her children seeing her getting arrested again,” she told the SIEG agents a little more than she had the week before about her antics with the pills from the Netherlands – namely, who it was that was facilitating the shipping of them: Scott Way.
Serious business
As it turns out, the day before Mann’s second arrest, Way was located, pulling away from Mann’s residence. Out on Route 148 south of the Cambria area, a SIEG agent on March 22 observed Way fail to use a turn signal when changing lanes, and that was all the excuse he needed to make a traffic stop, assisted by an Illinois State Police trooper who was nearby.
The two approached Way’s vehicle and reported that they “smelled the odor of burnt cannabis” coming from it when they got close enough to detect it.
Way exited the vehicle as ordered and a search was conducted; a “quantity of cannabis wax” was located inside.
When taken into custody and Mirandized at the Williamson County Jail, Way was helpful and forthcoming: He told authorities that he had ordered a minimum of 6,000 MDMA pills from a company in Europe over the past several months, and had them delivered to Mann’s residence. He noted that “pills that weren’t intercepted by law enforcement” he sold to various persons in southern Illinois.
Way was charged March 23 with two Class X felonies, Manufacturing between 600 and 1500 Ecstasy pills, and Controlled Substance Trafficking.
He, as well as Mann, was held this time on a $400,000 bail ($40,000 cash bond). No roomie was going to come bond either one of them out on this arrest.
Stratas shaken; ‘living in a tent’…?
Way’s arrest prompted differing responses among the many stratas of society throughout Williamson, Franklin, Saline and Hardin counties who either have had dealings with him in the past nearly ten years, or more importantly, those who might be having dealings with him currently.
The young Scotty Alyn Way, son of beloved Harrisburg-area coach Al Way, was himself headed toward a career in education and coaching, having been hired on at Hardin County Schools in 2007 before dope-moving cut his career short.
Caught with a freezer full of dope and a house full of dope and paraphernalia, he ultimately entered a plea of guilty to a cocaine possession charge in 2009, and received four years probation in exchange…which he proceeded to screw up badly, testing hot for cocaine on urinalysis almost immediately.
With Bryan Drew (of Franklin County) as his attorney, Way ultimately was sentenced to a boot camp in Pope County, having tested hot for cocaine the day before he was to make the decision of 120 days in boot camp or 90 days in DOC (he’d spent a considerable amount of time in the Saline County Detention Center leading up to sentencing, lightening the DOC stint.)
The early screw-ups out of the way, Way came back to the area and told compatriots that he was “homeless” and living behind the hospital in Harrisburg in a tent, which may or may not have been the case, depending on where he was camping out; the country club, with its own movers and shakers, happens to be located “behind the hospital” and so it’s entirely possible that Way was merely camping out in the posh back yard of a Harrisburg elite…many of which have been connected with the city’s shady “gentlemen’s club,” the “Chess Club” (see other articles in this and previous editions dating back to November 2015.)
This might make a lot of sense, if in fact the rumors of high-end drugs (including, reasonably, club drugs like XTC) flowing through the place freely are valid.
Thus far, Way has been making the Williamson County Jail his “home,” as none in the club circle – nor any other circle in which Way might run – has been willing to fork over $40,000.
Way was set for a preliminary hearing shortly after release of this issue, on April 18. In court paperwork, he’s claiming to be representing himself.
Mann’s next hearing is just a pretrial, on April 25.