An Arcadia man ran from officers during an early morning traffic stop on Vernon Street and was booked on a felony gun charge after officers found a firearm beneath the driver’s seat of his vehicle, according to an affidavit.
Jamichael Caldwell, 34, was arrested at 1:25 a.m. Sept. 4 by the Ruston Police Department and booked into the Lincoln Parish Detention Center on five counts, including possession of a firearm by a convicted felon.
Two Ruston police officers stopped the vehicle at Vernon Street and Mills Avenue at about 12:46 a.m. after seeing that its Louisiana temporary tag was improperly displayed. When the driver, later identified as Caldwell, rolled his window down, a large amount of smoke flowed from inside the vehicle and carried a strong odor commonly associated with burning marijuana. Caldwell admitted he had been smoking marijuana.
Caldwell was asked to step out of the vehicle and did so, moving to the front of a patrol unit, where an officer advised him of his rights under Miranda. He gave his name and date of birth, then turned and ran south. After multiple verbal commands to stop, Caldwell stopped and laid on the ground so that officers could place hand restraints on him.
As Caldwell was escorted to a patrol unit and placed inside, the second officer approached the driver’s side of the stopped vehicle and saw a firearm resting beneath the driver’s seat. A search of the vehicle turned up an open container of an alcoholic beverage, the firearm and a small bag of marijuana.
Caldwell was transported to the detention center and turned over to its custody. In addition to the firearm count, he was booked on possession of a Schedule I controlled dangerous substance, resisting an officer by fleeing, an open container violation and driving without a required driver’s license.
This information has been provided by a law enforcement agency as public information. Persons named or shown in photographs or video as suspects in a criminal investigation, or arrested and charged with a crime, have not been convicted of any criminal offense and are presumed innocent until proven guilty in a court of law.
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