11 KALISPELL TEENS CHARGED IN MARIJUANA STING

KALISPELL - A police officer posing as a high school student wrapped up more than two months in the classroom Tuesday with the arrest of 11 Kalispell teens on charges of drug dealing.

"There will probably be more arrests," said Frank Garner, chief of police in Kalispell.  "We're also investigating reports that one parent might have been supplying some of the drugs to the kids."

All 11 were busted for selling marijuana to an undercover policeman during the past couple months.

The investigation began, Garner said, when school officials learned that some students were selling drugs during school hours with little fear of detection.  Teachers would hear rumors, Garner said, and sometimes would see activity that raised suspicion.  A school resource officer, or classroom cop, also was gathering information.

Finally, he said, school administrators called police, offering details that included names of some of the suspected students.

The cops checked those names "and we found we had seen some of those kids before.  We had corroborating evidence that they might be selling drugs."

With that evidence in hand, Garner called on Michael Robinson, a 23-year-old policeman from Billings, to "enroll" in Flathead High School as a senior.

Garner said his department has, in the past, brought in officers from other towns to help with undercover work, but never before have they placed anyone in the local schools.  The other option, he said, is to use a "bad-guy informant," someone who is involved in illegal activity but is willing to provide evidence to police.

"But we obviously couldn't do that here," Garner said, as it would not do to have police installing a local drug dealer in the high school.

Robinson, while taking a "fairly typical class schedule," established a network of drug sources, buying marijuana on many occasions.  Most of the young sellers were unrelated, Garner said, and were not organized into any sort of drug ring.

That is not uncommon in high schools, he said, adding that most teens buy drugs from peers, not from a shady stranger on a street corner.

While at the school, Robinson also set up purchases of the club drug ecstasy and methamphetamine, but those drug deals fell through.

"He tried," Garner said, "but we finally needed to cut it off.  We couldn't allow it to go on any longer.  We didn't want the drug dealers feeling safe dealing drugs in the school."

Tuesday morning, Garner's department partnered with the Northwest Drug Task Force, creating "arrest teams" of two or three officers each.

Each team went to the house of a suspect, and made the arrest before school hours.  One teen was arrested at the school.

In addition, Garner said, police served one search warrant and seized five vehicles.

"It was perfect," Garner said of the early morning sweep.  "Everything went as smooth as could be."