Burnsville Woman Arrested on Drug Possession Warrant

A Burnsville woman was arrested Tuesday in Shakopee on a warrant charging her with felony methamphetamine possession.

Deanna Marie Gregory, 43, was charged last year with first-degree drug possession, which carries a maximum penalty of 30 years in prison and a $1 million fine. She also faces a gross misdemeanor charge of receiving stolen property.

Gregory remained in the Dakota County Jail Tuesday pending a Wednesday hearing.

According to the criminal complaint, agents of the Dakota County Drug Task Force were contacted last August by police in West Fargo, N.D., who had information about property stolen from West Fargo.

A confidential informant told police that Joshua Andrew Steckroat, 27, of Moorhead had been burglarizing homes in the Fargo-Moorhead area and transporting the stolen items to the Twin Cities, where he traded them for methamphetamine.

Steckroat was sentenced earlier this year in Cass County, N.D., to 30 months in prison on a burglary conviction.

The informant said Steckroat made daily trips to the Twin Cities with the stolen property. On July 29, 2010, the informant came to the Twin Cities to identify the location on Burnsville’s Glenhurst Avenue where the property was taken.

The informant – who accompanied Steckroat twice on trips to the Twin Cities – described a purple scooter, black stereo speakers, a Canon camcorder, an external hard drive and a Garmin GPS, among other stolen items that the informant knew were brought to the Twin Cities.

The informant said the methamphetamine was not stored in the Glenhurst Avenue home, but was transported by Gregory. The informant also said that the stolen items were sold on Craigslist by an individual the informant knew only as “Brad.”

Investigators from the drug task force and Burnsville, West Fargo, Fargo and Moorhead police departments executed a search warrant on Gregory’s home last Aug. 4. Among the items found during that search were containers holding more than 58 grams of methamphetamine, $2,000 in cash, a number of items of drug paraphernalia and a large number of items reported stolen from the Fargo-Moorhead area.

Police also found Gregory, her husband and a 9-year-old girl in the apartment.

Gregory was scheduled to appear at a hearing June 22. When she failed to appear, a warrant for her arrest was issued.