May 16--GENEVA -- Felony and misdemeanor charges have been filed against a man after a stranger leaped out of his car during a routine traffic stop, city police reports show.
Jeffrey Varner, 26, of Ashtabula, was giving a stranger a ride just after midnight Monday, he said, when he was pulled over by Geneva Police Officer Roger Wilt. Varner pulled into the Domino's Pizza parking lot on North Broadway when his passenger -- identity unknown -- jumped from the car and took off through the neighborhood.
"(Varner) said he did not know who the passenger was, just that he was giving the guy a ride from Water Street to the Circle K," Wilt said.
That story didn't add up, Wilt said, as Varner was driving away from the Circle K store.
"It did not appear Varner was being honest about the passenger," he said.
Varner was arrested for not having a driver's license, police reports show, and during a search of his vehicle officers found a six-pack of beer -- two consumed and the rest still cold.
In the back seat, officers found a backpack with a prescription pill bottle containing several cut straws used as "snorting tubes," Wilt said, several plastic baggies with white residue, a baggy of marijuana and a razor blade.
The white powder residue later tested positive as methamphetamine, police reports show.
Also inside the backpack, officers discovered a scale, a hypodermic needle, more snorting straws and a glass marijuana pipe.
Wilt said Varner was quick to say the backpack belonged to his mysterious, missing passenger.
"There were items in the pack that showed (Varner) to be the owner," Wilt said, and noted the prescription pill bottle had Varner's name on it.
Varner failed the field sobriety test, police reports show, and refused to submit to a drug test.
Varner is charged with operating a vehicle while intoxicated, driving under suspension, driving without a license, possession of a drug abuse instrument, felony drug abuse, and possession of drug paraphernalia, Western County Court records show.
He claimed indigency and filed for the aid of a public defender, court records show.
Varner has a history of legal troubles, as he spent two years in jail for burglary and safecracking in 2004, court records show.
Wilt said officers still don't know the identity of Varner's passenger, nor why the man ran during the traffic stop.
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