deck — Investigators believe Sequim operation largest county has seen
SEQUIM – Arrests involving more than 1,000 growing marijuana plants is the biggest pot bust Clallam County investigators have seen.
Three people have been arrested.
Jamie Alister Armitage, 54, and Cheryl A. Armitage, 57, both of Sequim, were charged Monday with manufacture of marijuana, possession of more than 40 grams of marijuana and maintaining a vehicle or premises for drug trafficking.
Jamie Armitage was also charged with conspiracy.
Both were being held in the Clallam County jail on $250,000 bail and were scheduled to be arraigned today.
Ronald Dean Brandenburg, 63, was arrested Wednesday.
The Armitage couple was arrested after officers with the Olympic Peninsula Narcotics Enforcement Team searched a shop on Burling Road Dec. 13 and found more than 1,000 marijuana plants in various stages of growth.
Brandenburg was the owner of the Burling Road property. He was arrested at the shop.
The property is near another residence on East Sequim Bay Road, were investigators found an additional 150 plants and “several pounds” of processed marijuana.
The Armitages were arrested at the East Sequim Bay Road property.
A search of their residence on Eberle Lane in Sequim yielded no marijuana, documents say.
OPNET agents were assisted by deputies from Clallam County Sheriff’s Department, Immigration and Customs Enforcement and the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency.
Court documents say that investigators had been receiving tips that Jamie Armitage had been growing marijuana at the East Sequim Bay Road property for 10 years.
But additional tips about the Burling Road property were received in November.
OPNET Commander Capt. Ron Cameron said the case is still under investigation but that more arrests are not expected.
