Police: Ashland man exchanged heroin for straw purchased firearms before Friday’s chase
SUBMITTED PHOTO - Damage to an Ashland Police cruiser is seen Friday after a pursuit.
ASHLAND – The passenger in last week’s police pursuit here was exchanging heroin for straw purchased firearms, according to court documents.
Torre Ervin, 33, of 203 Walnut Street, is facing 31 charges, including eight felonies, related to the illegal purchase of firearms.
Ervin was the passenger in a police pursuit last week that wrecked an Ashland police car and had dive teams searching for handguns in the Mahanoy Creek.
According to the criminal complaint filed Friday by Agent Daniel Block of the state Office of Attorney General, Bureau of Narcotics Investigation and Drug Control, state and federal law enforcement had been conducting an investigation into the alleged straw purchases.
A straw purchase is when someone purchases a firearm through the proper channels and then gives that firearm to someone else illegally.
An informant told law enforcement that at least seven firearms were purchased in such a manner from Kahler’s Gun Shop in Lavelle.
The informant had purchased all of those for Ervin, who was convicted of several narcotics and firearms violations in New Jersey and is prohibited from owning a firearm.
Ervin paid that informant and another individual for the weapons in narcotics. Ervin was present for those purchases and would pick the weapons out, according to police.
Those two told police that they knew what they were doing was illegal, but they feared Ervin, “who had threatened them in the past.”
On March 29, the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms (ATF) Newark office visited Kahler’s Gun Shop and asked about the alleged purchases. The owner said he had remembered the individuals involved, and was told that Ervin was one of the informant’s adopted child.
The week of May 15, Ervin asked the informant to purchase more firearms or to trade firearms for narcotics.
On Thursday, May 18, they exchanged text messages regarding the informant finding more firearms for Ervin and arranged for the exchange of two handguns for “a brick and a half” of heroin.
The two agreed to the exchange taking place Friday morning, and Ashland Police, along with agents from the ATF’s Allentown field office and the state Attorney General’s office set up surveillance on Ervin’s home at 203 Walnut Street, as well as the informant’s home.
Around 11am, the exchange took place. Ervin gave the informant $50 in narcotics and wanted to see the firearms before the rest of the narcotics were exchanged. The informant provided two firarms, a Glod 9mm and a Walther .380cal, and Ervin provided the remainder of heroin or fentanyl, packed in white glassine packets with stamped markings.
Ervin then entered a Chrysler minivan, driven by Sade Hill, 26, of 203 Walnut Street, and police attempted to stop them. Hill struck an Ashland Police cruiser which had pulled across the road to block the fleeing van, and a chase ensued into Butler Township, ending on Beaver Dam Road.
In that pursuit, Ervin tossed the two firearms into the Mahanoy Creek along Hoffman Boulevard, and the Mahanoy City West End dive team was requested to find those weapons.
Ervin taken into custody and brought to the Ashland police station for an interview.
He was arraigned Friday by on-call Magisterial District Judge Stephen Bayer and committed to Schuylkill County Prison, unable to post $500,000 bail.
Among the charges he is facing are felony prohibited possession of a firearm, felony making a materially false written statement to purchase a firearm, six counts of felony conspiracy to commit the same, and a host of misdemeanor conspiracy charges.
Hill is also jailed on felony charges of fleeing or attempting to elude police and aggravated assault along with misdemeanor reckless endangerment. She was arraigned by Bayer and committed to Schuylkill County Prison, unable to post $50,000 bail.
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