April 14, 2011
Gary Davidson
Public Information Officer

28 ARRESTED DURING DELTONA CRIME SUPPRESSION OPERATION

It was about 8:30 p.m. Thursday night when a Volusia County Sheriff’s deputy spotted a car traveling west on Howland Boulevard in Deltona. The driver wasn’t wearing his seatbelt and the vehicle kept swaying outside of the traffic lane. That was more than enough reason for the deputy to stop the vehicle. Moments later, an Orange City police officer rolled up on the scene to assist. Together, when their investigation was completed, the driver, 31-year-old Perry Feist of DeLand, was under arrest for being in possession of Xanax without a prescription. The passenger, 25-year-old Ashley Wyckoff of DeLand, also was arrested when she was found to have crushed up Oxycodone pills and two smoking devices in her purse.

A little more than two hours later, another traffic stop, this time in the vicinity of Elkcam Boulevard and Lake Helen-Osteen Road in Deltona, yielded a loaded handgun that resulted in the arrest of the driver, 26-year-old Gregory Childress of Sanford.

The three arrests, however, were far from random. They were among more than two dozen arrests Thursday that resulted from a large-scale, multi-agency suppression operation targeting street crime in the Deltona area. Sheriff’s deputies from the agency’s patrol, investigations, crime suppression, DUI and traffic units split up into five teams and launched the operation at about 2 p.m. on Thursday. Saturating the community and focusing on crime hot spots, their primary targets were burglaries and other property crimes, drugs and traffic offenses. And they had plenty of help, with the Orange City Police Department, West Volusia Narcotics Task Force, the FBI’s Safe Streets Task Force gang unit and probation officers with the Florida Department of Corrections also participating in the coordinated operation.

The operation resulted in 28 arrests, the seizure of one gun, 16.5 grams of marijuana and the issuance of 123 traffic citations.

More operations are planned in the future.