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Fort Dodge man arrested for growing marijuana

Police found an operation in plain sight in his residence

Eric Gambill Jr.

Eric Gambill Jr., 26, of Fort Dodge, was arrested on an outstanding warrant for parole violation shortly after police responded to a welfare check at approximately 9:43 p.m. Tuesday, according to the Fort Dodge Police Department.

Officers went to Gambill’s home at 1428 Fourth Ave. N., where they found 20 pot plants in plain sight instead of Gambill.

Criminal complaints say that a neighbor told police they saw a man running down the street “in a hurry” as patrol cars approached the house.

Gambill was located, with the assistance of the Webster County Sheriff’s Office, in the 600 block of North 15th Street shortly after.

With the permission of the home’s owners, detailed by criminal complaints as the defendant’s mother and stepfather, police executed a search warrant on the home, seizing at least 20 marijuana plants in various stages of growth, heaters, humidifiers, lights and grow chemicals.

Gambill appeared in Webster County Magistrate Court Thursday morning to answer to 10 new charges: five counts of failure to affix a drug stamp and five counts of intent to manufacture/deliver marijuana, all Class D felonies.

Gambill said in law enforcement interviews that the plants were strictly for personal use, according to police reports.

Gambill’s bail for the new charges is set at $50,000, but he will be held in Webster County Jail without bond for his parole violation charge.

Court records indicate that the defendant was on parole for a second-degree robbery conviction stemming from a 2011 incident at Liquor & Tobacco Outlet at the corner of First Avenue North and North Ninth Street, formerly Pop and Go. Gambill was sentenced to 10 years in prison for that conviction.

Gambill was also charged with second-degree robbery for an incident at Target in 2009. A plea deal resulted in that charge being reduced to assault causing bodily injury, for which he was sentenced to a suspended prison sentence and two years of probation in 2010. His probation on that was revoked almost two years later.

A preliminary hearing for Gambill is set for Feb. 7.

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