May 13, 2008 10:43 pm
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Jim Moss 5/13/08 pullout at bottom
By Jeff Lehr
jlehr@joplinglobe.com
A homicide victim whose body was discovered May 5 in a field near Granby had been under suspicion in Minnesota for trafficking in opium.
Ger Lee, 40, was arrested and charged in June of last year in St. Paul, Minn., with first-degree possession of narcotics.
“They told us it was for distributing opium,” Newton County Sheriff Ken Copeland told the Globe.
Copeland acknowledged that investigators with the Newton County Sheriff’s Department are exploring a possible drug-trafficking angle to the murder of Lee, who was of Laotian descent. His skeleton was found with a bullet inside the skull.
Lee was known to have been visiting a woman in the Cassville area with whom he has children in common in late December and early January. He is believed to have left Cassville on Jan. 10 to return to Minnesota. He never made it back to St. Paul, according to the sheriff.
A male cousin who lives in Barry County reported Lee missing on Feb. 21. The same cousin recognized a gold necklace found around the neck of the skeleton when a photograph of the piece of jewelry was made public last week.
The cousin came forward and identified the necklace as belonging to Lee, and dental records confirmed the body was that of Lee.
The Ramsey County Attorney’s Office in Minnesota released a criminal complaint sheet to the Globe on Tuesday that showed Lee was charged with the felony drug offense on June 28, 2007. He had been arrested the previous day in a traffic stop related to a shooting incident in St. Paul.
The complaint states that an officer stopped a vehicle Lee was driving at 4 a.m. June 27 as “a possible suspect vehicle in an assault where several people had been shot with a .22-caliber gun.” The officer saw Lee and a passenger making “furtive movements” with their hands after the vehicle was stopped, the complaint states.
The corner of a cloth towel was spotted sticking out of the center console of the vehicle once the occupants were removed, the document states. An officer opened the console and saw the towel wrapped around an object the officer thought might be a handgun, the complaint states.
It proved instead to contain a package of a little less than a pound of opium, according to the complaint.
Lee reportedly told the arresting officer he was from Missouri and listed his address with police as rural Washburn. He also reportedly asked to be given some of his “medicine.” When asked what he meant, he told police: “The stuff in the console.” He said he used it as a painkiller, the complaint states.
Lee was arrested, and police seized $1,392 in cash and a key card for the Exel Inn also found in his possession. A search of a room at the St. Paul motel reportedly turned up $10,000 in cash, additional suspected opium and a phone bill in Lee’s name.
The document does not state what connection, if any, was ever established between Lee’s vehicle and the shooting incident.
Copeland told the Globe that St. Paul police indicated to his investigators that Lee posted $50,000 bond and was released, although the documents provided by the Minnesota prosecutor’s office show the original warrant bearing a $100,000 bond.
The case against Lee was dismissed in December, according to the Ramsey County Attorney’s Office. The prosecutor involved could not be reached for comment Tuesday, and the Globe was not successful in reaching any St. Paul police representative familiar with the case.
But Copeland said police there told his investigators that Lee remained under suspicion for drug trafficking.
“They had a preliminary hearing scheduled for it, and they had some technical problems and it had to be dismissed,” the sheriff said. “But they were preparing to refile charges.”
Newton County investigators believe Lee may have left Cassville for Minnesota with another person. Lee reportedly told his cousin that a friend was going with him. Investigators believe the vehicle he was driving was returned to Minnesota. They have not said if it has been located.
Opium
The Minnesota complaint against Ger Lee states that opium in a package discovered in his vehicle weighed almost 14 ounces.
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