A Sonoma County Sheriff’s Deputy arrested a wanted Sacramento felon for possession of a handgun and drugs at a SR motel. The incident took place yesterday at about 3:00 PM at the Hotel Santa Rosa in the 2600 block of Cleveland Ave. A deputy patrolling the parking lot came across a silver colored Lexus parked with a man leaning into the car going through a duffle bag.
The deputy stopped to check out the situation, thinking the man might be burglarizing the car. When the deputy contacted the man, who was later identified as 37-year-old Tyler Harrison Smith out of Sacramento, he noticed Smith to be abnormally sweating, he spoke rapidly and moved fidgety as if he was possibly under the influence of drugs.
Smith wasn’t able to give a good explanation for being in the car. He said it belonged to his girlfriend but he changed his girlfriend’s name a couple of times and he didn’t know her whereabouts. He gave a false name of Jonathan Smith to the deputy but changed his birthday a couple of times. Smith did say he was staying in the motel and was from Sacramento.
The deputy contacted the Sacramento County Sheriff’s Office and they confirmed that Smith had used the alias of Johnathan Smith before to avoid law enforcement detection. They also found that Smith was on probation and had a felony warrant for drug sales out of Sacramento. A picture of Smith was sent from Sacramento County Sheriff’s and it was confirmed that Smith was the wanted felon.
Smith was arrested and deputies found a methamphetamine smoking pipe in his pants pocket. In the car deputies found a loaded Glock 9 mm handgun, several loaded ammunition magazines, a backpack of marijuana, a stun gun/billy club combination type weapon, two counterfeit bills, two packages of marijuana (4 grams) and two packages of heroin totaling 38 grams. Also in the car was a collection of rare coins and some foreign currency. Detectives were called to the scene and are following up on the rare coins and the foreign currency.
Ultimately Smith was booked into the Sonoma County Jail on a number of drug and weapons charges along with providing false identification to the deputies. He is being held without bail due to his Sacramento County warrant.
Prepared by: Sgt. Spencer Crum
Media Inquiries: 707-565-3941
CR 180201022
