BALCONY-HOPPING SUSPECT PINNED DOWN IN DRUG PROBE

Dressed only in a pair of black leather pants, Michael Grant might have
looked like a daredevil acrobat, leaping from balcony to balcony of a
Hackensack high-rise Wednesday night.

But Grant wasn't putting on a show: He was making a bid for freedom, police
said.

Officers and federal agents finally cornered Grant, 32, and charged him
with participating in a drug network that imported large amounts of
marijuana from Mexico for sale in Connecticut.

Inside his eighth-floor Prospect Avenue apartment -- which Grant shared
with his girlfriend and their 1-year-old child -- police said they found a
semiautomatic pistol loaded with illegal hollow-point bullets, a pound of
marijuana, and about $100,000 in cash.

Grant was one of several suspects arrested in a nationwide sweep Wednesday
night and Thursday by U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration agents and local
police. Agents arrested six other men in Connecticut, along with an
undisclosed number of suspects in Arizona and Florida, according to Delcie
Thibault, a spokeswoman for the U.S. Attorney's Office in Connecticut.

The sweep capped a three-year investigation in which federal and state
authorities seized more than 1,500 pounds of marijuana, $800,000 in cash,
five cars, guns, and additional assets worth more than $500,000, Thibault said.

Hackensack police and federal authorities do not believe Grant, the only
person arrested in New Jersey as part of "Operation Brass Pot," sold drugs
in Bergen County.

"We think he was working out of New York City and Connecticut," said
Hackensack police Inspector Mike Mordaga. "It's not uncommon for a drug
dealer to get a residence in Bergen County because they feel safe."

For one thing, Mordaga explained, there is less risk of their being ripped
off by other dealers. They particularly like high-rise buildings, he said,
because they are more difficult for police to watch.

The building proved a trap, however, once police were at Grant's door.

Grant, who police said also used the names Cory Drake and Nicholas Reid,
was one of five men named in a federal indictment handed up in U.S.
District Court in New Haven, Conn., on Wednesday.

Narcotics detectives and DEA agents went to Grant's apartment at 170
Prospect Ave. about 6:30 p.m. to serve the warrant, which charges Grant
with possession of, and possession with intent to distribute more than 100
kilograms of marijuana.

Grant's girlfriend, Shanlander Wahrmann, answered the door and stepped out
into the hall to speak with police, Mordaga said. She tried to pull the
door shut behind her as Grant pushed it closed from the inside, he said.
Officers pushed their way into the apartment in time to see Grant scurry
onto the balcony, Mordaga said.

"He dropped himself down from balcony to balcony," he said. "Each time he
went onto a balcony, he tried to gain access to the apartments."

Officers watched from above while others waited on the ground as Grant
maneuvered his way down to the fourth floor, Mordaga said. Seeing the
officers below him, Grant pushed open a sliding-glass door and dashed
through an apartment.

Then he dashed back up the stairwell before running into a group of
officers coming from the eighth floor, Mordaga said. They arrested Grant
without a struggle, he said.

Detectives smelled marijuana inside the apartment, so they got a search
warrant from Hackensack Municipal Court Judge Louis Dinice and later found
the marijuana in a kitchen cabinet, Mordaga said. Inside the bedroom, they
found a box filled with bundles of cash totaling about $100,000, he said.
The gun, a 9mm semiautomatic, was in a nightstand, Mordaga said.

Police seized two of Grant's cars, a 1992 BMW and a 2000 Cadillac Escalade
sport-utility vehicle. The Escalade is outfitted with a television and DVD
player, as well as a navigation system, they said.

In addition to the federal charge, Grant also is charged wth resisting
arrest, possession of marijuana with intent to distribute the drug,
possession of a weapon, possession of hollow-point ammunition, being a
felon in possession of a firearm, and endangering the welfare of a child.

He was ordered held in the Bergen County Jail on $100,000 bail, then was
taken to Newark for arraignment on the federal charges.

Wahrmann also was charged with drug possession, weapons possession,
hindering apprehension, and endangering the welfare of a child.

The child was turned over to the state Division of Youth and Family
Services on Wednesday night, Mordaga said.

Officials at the U.S. Attorney's Office would not specifically discuss
Grant's alleged role in the network or the extent of the organization.

Others named in the indictment were Kevin Casey, 31, of West Haven, Conn.;
Jeffrey "Ziggy" Nathenson, 34, of Trumbull, Conn.; David "Jamaican Pete"
Scale, 34, of Bridgeport, Conn.; and Ernest Ortale, 51, of Wolcott, Conn.
Two other men arrested on state drug charges during the investigation were
identified as Joseph Capozzi, 31, of Milford, Conn., and Steven Consiglio,
40, of East Haven, Conn.

The case is being handled by the U.S. Attorney's Organized Crime Strike
Force Unit.