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Drug trial to resume Tuesday

A jury trial resumes Tuesday in Butler County Common Pleas Court for a Butler man accused of dealing drugs after a March 2020 police raid turned up $4,000 in cocaine, fentanyl-laced heroin and other drugs.

Tywann Raheem Windham, 37, is facing six felony counts of possession of a controlled substance with intent to deliver and other charges. Judge Timothy F. McCune is presiding over the trial.

Testimony began Monday with Ryan Doctor, a Butler City police officer and member of the Butler County Drug Task Force, telling the jury about surveillance of Windham’s home, a drug purchase made there by a confidential informant and the task force raid.

A drug chemist from the state police crime lab in Greensburg testified about the results of tests she conducted on the drugs confiscated during the search.

Testimony is scheduled to resume Tuesday with co-defendant Kari Lee Summerville, 41, expected to take the witness stand.

Summerville, who is facing many of the same charges, was living with Windham in the home, which is owned by her mother. They are married, but estranged. Prosecutors said she was offered leniency in exchange for her testimony against Windham.

Doctor told the jury of six men and six women that surveillance of the home at 507 Virginia Ave. in Butler began in January 2020 based on information from a confidential informant. He said officers saw a lot of foot traffic consisting of people arriving at the house and leaving after five or 10 minutes.

Later that month, the confidential informant purchased two bricks of heroin containing 99 stamp bags with $400 in official funds, Doctor said. The stamp bags were white with red lips and the words “Kiss Me,” he said.

He said Windham accompanied the informant when he left the home after the purchase.

In March before the raid, officers took two bags of garbage from outside of the house. The bags included many empty small plastic bags with the corners missing and many other empty plastic bags, including empty “Kiss Me” bags, he said.

During the raid, when task force officers executed a search warrant, Summerville was found with marijuana, a blunt containing marijuana and some pills in her possession, Doctor said. The pills did not contain illegal drugs, he said.

He said suspected heroin and crack cocaine, four cell phones, scales, plastic bags, suspected drug packaging materials, $914, marijuana paraphernalia and a small bag of marijuana were seized during the raid.

“A large amount of illegal drugs were found,” Benjamin Simon, assistant district attorney, said during his opening statement.

Doctor said most of the drugs were found on Windham’s side of the bedroom.

He said no needles or other paraphernalia used to inject heroin and crack cocaine were found in the search.

Under cross examination by Joseph Smith, assistant public defender, Doctor said evidence of Summerville living at the home was found in the bags of garbage, but no evidence of Windham living there was found in the trash.

Windham had nothing illegal in his possession when he was searched during the raid, he said.

Smith argued that the case against Windham is an example of targeted prosecution. He said the home, not Windham, was the subject of the initial investigation.

Text messages about drug deals were found on Summerville’s phone and not Windham’s phone, he said.

“She was using Tywann as a sheep,” Smith said during his opening statement.

Alyshia Meyers, of the state police crime lab, said white chunky substances found in some bags was cocaine, a light tan colored powder found in other bags was made of heroin, fentanyl and acetylfentanyl, and some pink, shoe-shaped tablets contained a substitute for cathinone.

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