Drug conspiracy trial continues

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September 1, 2010

Anonymous The Times-Tribune The Times-Tribune Wed Sep 01, 2010, 08:34 AM EDT

CORBIN — By Carl Keith Greene / Staff Writer

Day six of the London federal trial of five men charged in a multi-state drug conspiracy began with continuing testimony from Ernestina Hajric.

Hajric, originally charged in the indictment, on Aug. 9 filed an agreement to plead guilty to conspiring to distribute 500 or more grams of a mixture including cocaine.

She is a long-term friend of Kemal Dugalic and the mother of their two children.

In her testimony Tuesday she said officers had seized some $10,000 that K. Dugalic’s parents had given her for their children and other cash.

Emir Dadanovic, K. Dugalic, Omer Dugalic, Donta Hamilton and Jerdin Ovidio Yanes, are charged with conspiracy to deal in cocaine. Dadanovic is also charged with operating a criminal enterprise and laundering money.

Following her, law enforcement officers testified as to what they had seen regarding the five defendants in the Columbus, Ohio, area beginning in May 2009.

Lt. Cambron Ellison, part of the Columbus drug task force testified to stopping a Dodge Charger driven by Emir Dadanovic for too much window tinting and excessive speed.

Dadanovic was taken to the police headquarters and the car was confiscated.

Ellison said a white substance in the carpet tested in the field as positive for cocaine, however a piece of the carpet sent to a laboratory turned up no cocaine.

In the vehicle, he said, Mexican and U.S. currencies were found.

Five cellular telephones were found in the car as well as dryer sheets, which often are used to cover the smell of drugs. Dadanovic said the car had been loaned to him and told the police he was in the area looking for landscaping jobs, Ellison said.

Dadanovic was released by police.

In cross examination Dadanovic’s lawyer, W. Currie Milliken, stressed that carpet samples from the car did not show cocaine when examined by the Drug Enforcement Administration’s lab in Indianapolis and noted that “a few hundred dollars” were found in the car.

Ellison was followed by Charles Schauer, of the Chicago DEA office and fingerprint technologist.

He had identified two prints on a clear plastic bag and a plastic pill bottle as those of O. Dugalic.

After those officers, six officers from local agencies and the DEA in the Columbus area testified.

Russell Moore of Westerville, James Hamilton of Upper Arlington and Mike Justice, of the Union County sheriff’s office were members of a Columbus drugs task force.

They were working with DEA agents Janea Carroll, Scott Sundquist and resident agent Etchison.

They all testified as to monitoring O. and K. Duglalic, and Dadanovic as they apparently made connections with others in the Columbus area.

They had been warned by Kentucky drug enforcement people that Omer Dugalic was on his way to Columbus.

The officers’ testimony was about watching the six entering town and visiting others, exchanging shoe boxes and shopping bags.

The exchanges were made near Columbus hotels.

But none of the officers could confirm that the packages held drugs or money.

As well as surveillance, their investigations included finding what they called evidence of drug ledgers at the Columbus home of K. Dugalic.

The trial continues Wednesday.

Batlak, Page and Bjelogravic also pleaded guilty to the second count of the indictment to which Hajric had pleaded guilty. Sentencing for them is scheduled for later in the year.

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