A Whitley County Sheriff’s Deputy arrested three Lexington residents Thursday morning, who were returning to Kentucky after one of them visited a Florida pain clinic and had over 400 pills in the vehicle.
Whitley County Sheriff’s Capt. Todd Shelley charged the driver, Damyon Zachary Skudlarek, 34, with operating a motor vehicle while under the influence and operating on a suspended operators license.
He charged passengers Neil T. Root, 33, and Johnny B. Gerald, 44, both with public intoxication.
Shelley received a complaint of a black car driving erratically on I-75 shortly before 8 a.m. Thursday.
He first spotted the 2004 black Pontiac car near Exit 15 and stopped it near the 18-mile marker.
"The vehicle was all over the roadway," Shelley wrote on an arrest citation.
The driver and both passengers had slurred speech, and failed field sobriety tests, according to arrest citations.
Skudlarek told police that he had taken three Oxycodone pills and one Alprazolam pill. Root told police he had taken some Oxycontin and Gerald told police that he had taken some Oxycodone, according to arrest citations.
Shelley said that the Skudlarek had recently visited West Palm Beach Pain and Recovery Clinic in Florida.
He had prescriptions for both drugs that he had taken, and police found 385 Oxycodone pills along with 51.5 Alprazolam pills in the vehicle, which were in their proper containers.
All three were lodged in the Whitley County Detention Center.
Because the pills were in their proper container, Shelley inventoried them and turned them in at the jail with Skudlarek’s other property that he can pick up when he posts bond.
Williamsburg K-9 Officer Brandon Prewitt assisted with the investigation.
