UTICA — A 49-year-old man has been charged with tampering with physical evidence after police say he discarded drugs in a booking area at the Utica Police Department.
Steven Brown of Utica was arrested July 29 in connection with contraband found nearly a month earlier at the police station.
On July 1, a police investigator walking through the booking area noticed a knotted baggie on the ground that had apparently been discarded by someone who had been there for a criminal investigation.
The investigator searched the area more thoroughly and found an additional 19 baggies that had been thrown away in a garbage can.
Surveillance footage showed a male detainee had removed the baggies from his mouth while seated on the booking bench and tried to dispose of them when the officer was not looking, police said.
The man was no longer in the booking area, and police learned he was on New York State parole supervision.
Brown was located at parole offices July 29 and brought to the police department to be charged.
He faces charges of tampering with physical evidence and criminal possession of a controlled substance in the third degree.
