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Officers discover cocaine in trailer

The Pasco County Sheriff's Office is looking for the owner of the trailer that had almost 64 pounds of the drug inside.

By COLLEEN JENKINS
Published October 6, 2005

HOLIDAY - Last week, Pasco County sheriff's detectives seized cocaine worth as much as $2.3-million from a travel trailer parked illegally outside a white stucco home in Holiday.

Now detectives have to figure out whose it is.

"We haven't put all the pieces together," said Lt. Robert Sullivan, who heads the sheriff's vice and narcotics unit.

What they do know: The cocaine, almost 64 pounds in all, is the most Pasco authorities have seized in two decades. The last publicized bust of that size was in 1986, when a raid on a cocaine lab run by Colombians in Shady Hills produced about 60 pounds of the drug.

So far, the drugs in the white and blue travel trailer appear to be more of a mystery. No arrests had been made as of Tuesday.

The vehicle is registered to Horacio Cruz of Alvin, Texas, according to a search warrant filed by detectives at the West Pasco Judicial Center. Cruz, the warrant said, has multiple narcotic-related arrests and was convicted of possessing cocaine with the intent to distribute. He is on federal probation.

Cruz hasn't owned the travel trailer long. Its previous owner, John Shaughnessy of Houston, Texas, told the St. Petersburg Times on Wednesday that he just sold the vehicle last month. Until right after Hurricane Rita, he said, it had been sitting on a consignment lot in Houston.

Local authorities received a tip about the travel trailer last week. They found it parked in front of the home of 60-year-old Minas P. Sarris, who lives at 1723 Colmar Drive. Sarris, who owns AAA-Plus Water Solution, could not be reached Wednesday.

He, too, has a long history of drug arrests, public records show. His arrests in Florida date back to 1976 and include importation of dangerous drugs and trafficking in large quantities of marijuana.

On May 3, he was arrested in Scottsdale, Ariz., for possession of 197 pounds of marijuana and 30 grams of cocaine and is now out of jail on bail, the search warrant said.

Sullivan would not comment on whether either Cruz or Sarris are suspects in the investigation.

On the morning of Sept. 30, a St. Petersburg police detective traveled to Holiday with Mattie, a Border collie trained to sniff out narcotics. The dog quickly alerted its handler to possible drugs inside the vehicle, prompting a Pasco detective to seek the search warrant.

The search was conducted later that day. Inside were 29 kilograms of cocaine, the equivalent of almost 64 pounds. According to Sullivan, the street value of the drugs would be nearly $600,000 if sold in bulk.

Drugs, however, often are sold in smaller packages. One gram would go for $60 to $80, Sullivan said. The amount inside the travel trailer equaled 29,000 grams, which could fetch between $1.7-million and $2.3-million.

He wouldn't say whether the drugs appeared to be for personal use or for sale, citing an investigation.

"We're trying to see who these drugs belong to," Sullivan said. "To talk about (the investigation) would really be irresponsible."

Times researcher Cathy Wos contributed to this report. Colleen Jenkins can be reached at 727 869-6236 or cjenkins@sptimes.com

[Last modified October 6, 2005, 01:14:18]