Police Raid Freemansburg Home

By Jack Tobias

Police raided a Freemansburg home Sunday morning, arrested an occupant who tried to escape and struggled with an officer, and confiscated drugs and stolen weapons, including an assault-style rifle, court records say.

Found inside the 224 1/2 Clearfield St. home of Pharaoh Wilfredo Castro, 25, was a Kel-Tec assault rifle, a Smith & Wesson SW40C pistol, and an unspecified amount of ammunition, the records say.

The guns, traced through their serial numbers, were found to be stolen.

Also confiscated during the raid, police say, were:

–About 102 grams of loose heroin and 278 individually packaged wax bags of heroin.

–Forty-three pills of the powerful painkiller Oxycodone and 60 pills of zolpidem tartrate, better known as Ambien, a sleeping pill.

–A "plethora" of drug paraphernalia, including pipes, scales, baggies and containers.

–About 30 grams of marijuana for personal use.

Borough Patrolman Jonathan Itterly, who is also a detective in the Northampton County Drug Task Force, wrote in a criminal complaint:

Police arrived with a search warrant at 7:53 a.m. Before the warrant was served, Castro admitted to Itterly that he had weapons and "controlled substances" in the home.

But that did not stop Castro from resisting arrest. Itterly said that while he tried to handcuff Castro, he attempted to escape through a doorway, then "struggled" with Itterly before being subdued.

In addition to the weapons and drugs, police found three cell phones, "drug activity logs," two laptops, and a "sum" of cash.

Castro was charged with receiving stolen property in connection with the suspected stolen weapons, a list of "prohibited acts" felonies and misdemeanors in connection with the drugs, and resisting arrest.

He was arraigned Sunday afternoon by on-duty District Judge James Narlesky of Hanover Township (Northampton County) and committed to Northampton County Prison in lieu of $100,000 bail.