Police Arrest Man for Illegal Possession of Drugs and Sea Turtle Eggs
The average person’s swimming skills in Florida are higher than what one finds in most parts of the world, but even experienced swimmers will admit that walking comes more naturally to humans than swimming. If you go to the contiguous beaches of South Florida, you can easily start on Fort Lauderdale Beach and walk five miles north before you feel that you are far from where you started, but swimming five miles is a more impressive athletic feat. Despite this, humans are better suited to swimming in the ocean than sea turtles are to traveling on land. Therefore, it is truly a wonder of nature that every mother sea turtle carries her aquatic body across the sand to lay her eggs in the sand, and when the eggs hatch, the baby turtles carry themselves to the ocean on their flippers. Sea turtles have been doing this for generations, and they do it with impressive skill. The biggest threat to this process is habitat loss. Therefore, Florida law prohibits humans from disturbing sea turtle nests and from possessing sea turtle eggs without a permit to do so. A Florida man who is facing criminal charges would still be in legal trouble if the sea turtle eggs were the only illegal item that police had found in his car during a traffic stop, but they also found illegal drugs. If a protected wildlife species played a role in your arrest on drug charges, as so often happens in Florida, contact a Florida drug offenses attorney.
Florida Man Was in the Wrong Place at the Wrong Time With the Eggs of the Wrong Species
Pursuant to a court order, Wesley Winters was supposed to stay away from his ex’s house. That was where a Flagler County Sheriff’s deputy found him, though, sitting in his van outside the house on Beverly Beach that the court had ordered him to stay away from. When a deputy approached the car, he saw small, round objects on the floor in front of the passenger’s seat and asked what they were. Winters, 53, admitted that they were sea turtle eggs. He said that he had found them in two nests that had been washed away, so he assumed that the eggs were not viable; he did not say what he planned to do with them.
Winters consented to a search of the vehicle, and when the deputy searched the car, he found marijuana, methamphetamine, fentanyl, one alprazolam pill, and drug paraphernalia. Winters is now facing criminal charges for drug possession and for violating a restraining order, as well as for illegal possession of sea turtle eggs.
Contact FL Drug Defense Group About Drug Cases
A Central Florida criminal defense lawyer can help you if you are facing drug charges after a traffic stop that took place under such bizarre circumstances that, if journalists describe it, they are sure to refer to you as “Florida Man.” Contact FL Drug Defense Group in Orlando, Florida to discuss your case.
Source:
clickorlando.com/news/local/2025/09/17/florida-man-arrested-in-flagler-county-had-sea-turtle-eggs-drugs-in-his-possession-deputies-say/
