Cops stanch Aspen’s weekend cocaine flow
The cocaine apparently flowed like wine in this little place called Aspen over the weekend, as three men were arrested Sunday at different times and charged with felony possession of a controlled substance, according to police reports and court documents.
The last of the three arrests occurred Sunday just after noon when Pitkin County sheriff’s deputies received a report of drugs at the Aspen airport, according to a deputy’s report. When they arrived they were directed to Nicholas Fabiancic, 28, of Brooklyn, New York, who was at the Transportation Security Administration checkpoint.
In addition to credit cards, a cellphone and boarding passes, the tray with Fabiancic’s belongings in it also contained “a wallet with a rolled-up $20 bill coming out of it … and a small bag containing an unknown white, powdery substance,” the report states.
“I asked Fabiancic if he knew what was in the small bag,” a sheriff’s deputy wrote in the report. “Fabiancic said he wasn’t sure.”
Fabiancic said he thought the substance might be adderall, though he admitted he didn’t have a prescription for that medicine.
The powder tested positive for cocaine, and deputies arrested Fabiancic at the checkpoint and booked him into the Pitkin County Jail, according to the report.
The other two arrests occurred early morning Sunday.
Two Aspen police officers on foot patrol in the downtown core spotted three men in an exterior stairwell that leads to the second story of a business in the 400 block of South Mill Street, according to an affidavit filed in Pitkin County District Court. One of the officers saw Ryan Buscher, 31, of Denver “holding a small, plastic baggy, emptying a white powdery substance onto a credit card,” the affidavit states.
Buscher said a “skinny hipster” man with blond hair in a bun on his head, between 20 and 30 years-old and on crutches, had approached him and asked if he wanted to buy some cocaine. Buscher and his friends pooled their money, followed the man to Rubey Park — where he said the man with the cocaine was arriving — and paid $250 for an “eight ball” of the drug, according to the affidavit.
The substance later tested positive for cocaine, the affidavit states.
Buscher in May pleaded guilty to one count of possession of a controlled substance and received a deferred sentence of one year of supervised probation, 20 hours of community service and nearly $2,500 in fees and court costs.
The second arrest came an hour and a half later when a police officer and a sheriff’s deputy spoke with Jason Stanton, 44, who matched the description of a suspect in a crime earlier that evening, according to an affidavit filed in Pitkin County District Court. Stanton was cleared as a suspect in the crime, though emergency dispatchers said he was the subject of a protection order and not allowed to consume alcohol.
Stanton, who smelled of alcohol, admitted to drinking two beers earlier that night and was arrested for violating the conditions of the protection order. Later, at the jail, a deputy discovered a small, plastic bag among Stanton’s possessions that tested positive for cocaine.
Editor’s note: This story has been updated to reflect the court proceedings of one of the suspects.