Tuesday, July 9, 2019

Beech Grove man arrested on felony charges

Beech Grove, IN (July 9, 2019) — A woman was grazed by a bullet during a botched drug deal in a Greenwood apartment last week. The marijuana-sale-turned-robbery was arranged via social media app Snapchat and happened on Thursday, police said. The suspect was arrested on Saturday after a woman who set up the drug deal came forward. Greenwood police released information about the incident on Tuesday.

Brandon D. Saloane, 27, a convicted felon who lives in Beech Grove, was arrested on felony charges of robbery and battery causing moderate injury to another person. The robbery happened about 12:30 p.m. on Thursday in the 900 block of Coventry Court, which is in an apartment complex west of U.S. 31, between Fry Road and County Line Road.


The resident of the apartment told police that he had received a message from a woman on Snapchat who was wanting to buy marijuana, according to a probable cause affidavit. Snapchat is a messaging cell phone application, where the messages are only available to users for short periods of time.

A man was going to come to the Greenwood apartment to pay for the marijuana. Saloane arrived and paid the resident $180 in cash and, in return, was given marijuana, the affidavit said. Saloane used the restroom, then shoved a gun into the resident’s side and told him to give him “everything,” the affidavit said.

A female resident of the apartment was hit in the face with the gun, then Saloane fired the gun at the ceiling, or it went off while he was hitting her. The bullet grazed her cheek, and she and the male resident fled the apartment and called 911, the report said.

While they were waiting for police outside, they saw the robber, later identified as Saloane, leave the apartment with items shoved up his shirt, the report said. They later determined he had taken $2,000 and about one-fourth of a pound of marijuana, police said.

The victim was taken to Community Hospital South, where she received eight stitches in her cheek. She has since been released, said Doug Roller, deputy chief of the Greenwood Police Department.

The next day, police learned about a possible suspect when a woman reported to police that she had set up the drug deal and that Saloane had stolen her gun.

The woman who set up the drug deal had met Saloane about a month earlier, and the two smoked weed together, she told police. She told police that she arranged for Saloane to buy the marijuana, but he then took her handgun and robbed the people he was supposed to be purchasing marijuana from, she told police.

Saloane was arrested on Saturday at an apartment in Beech Grove, and police found marijuana and digital scales in the apartment and his vehicle, the report said. He told detectives he had thrown the gun in the river because he did not want his parole officer to find it, the affidavit said.

Saloane has been on parole for two attempted robbery convictions in Hendricks County and a drug possession conviction in Marion County in 2014. He was sentenced to more than five years for those convictions. Saloane, of 100 N. 5th Ave., was taken to the Johnson County Jail, where he was held on $34,400 bond. No one else was arrested.

SOURCE: Daily Journal

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