A call from a concerned woman who thought there was a chemical fire in her apartment complex led to the arrest of three people for possession of marijuana with intent to distribute Dec 21.

Police were called to the Wellington Ridge apartments around 9 p.m. by a concerned resident. The woman told officers she had smelled what she believed were chemicals for two or three weeks now and was now concerned that the smell that initially just gave her a headache was a fire in the apartment below her.

The woman allowed Officer Kevin Fuller and Sgt. Mike Tinsley - who immediately noticed the smell and identified it as marijuana - to search her home. After finding no drugs they asked her when the new neighbors had moved in, and it turned out they had allegedly moved in around the same time as the smell started infiltrating the woman's apartment.

Officers went downstairs and knocked on the door. When it was finally opened by 20-year-old Cornequa Marcel Jordan, they immediately smelled a strong odor of marijuana. During questioning of Jordan, she reportedly told officers she had just gotten home and that she had friends over earlier and they had been around people who were smoking, saying that was probably where the smell came from.

She told officers several times there was no one there except her and allowed them to look around her apartment. When officers went to a closet door they found it was locked. She reportedly told officers that was the bathroom and "it stayed locked." When officers heard movement inside and questioned her about it, she told them there was one male inside.

They got the man, later identified as 18-year-old Quindarious Darnell Bell, to open the door and come outside of the bathroom. A continued search of the apartment led officers to the bedroom where they saw a foot peeking from the side of the bed. They were able to get 23-year-old Richard Darnell Bell out of the bedroom without incident. A search of him yielded $1,231 in his front pocket.

As some officers kept an eye on Jordan and the Bells, others began searching the apartment. In the kitchen they located two scales; there were six pairs of rubber gloves found in the laundry room, along with plastic bags and a vacuum sealer under the kitchen sink.

There were 17 ounces of marijuana found inside a pillow case in the bedroom and two bags with 4.5 ounces and 17.1 ounces of marijuana in some shoeboxes in the closet. After bringing in a K-9 officer they found marijuana in two more shoeboxes in the closet.

All in all, officers located 4.6 pounds of marijuana in the home.

All three were arrested and transported to the Newton County Detention Center where they remain, charged with possession of marijuana with intent to distribute and obstruction.