A jury of six, four women and two men took one hour Tuesday afternoon, May 24, to find Robert Byron Mullins guilty of trafficking in controlled substance (methamphetamine)/guilty of manufacturing methamphetamine/guilty of possession of controlled substance with the intent to sell or deliver/guilty of possession of listed chemical and guilty of conspiracy.

Sheriff Carson McCall said Mullins will remain at Lafayette County Detention Center where he has been incarcerated since his arrest in May 2004 until his sentence is handed down by Lafayette County Judge Harlow H. Land, Jr. in July of this year.

This is the first time a suspect charged with manufacturing methamphetamine has been heard by a jury in the Third Judicial Circuit.

One of the key witnesses in the two day trial was Detective Aubrey (A.P.) Land, Live Oak Police Department. Land, as an expert witness on clandestine labs, instructed the jury on the procedure used to set up a lab for the purpose of producing methamphetamine, the dangers to a community they impose, the effects of the drug on the user and the expense and danger involved in dismantling an active lab.

Detective Land told the jury that his experience comes from his involvement and training as one of the team members of Suwannee County Drug Task Force.

Land said Suwannee County Drug Task Force assisted Lafayette County Sheriff’s Office and Florida Department of Law Enforcement during Mullin’s arrest in May 2004.

According to arrest records Mullins was operating a lab in Lafayette County and was associated with two other labs, one in Lafayette County and another in Suwannee County at the time of his arrest. He was also serving a 12-year probation, sentenced in August 2002, from a 2001 arrest where he was charged with operating a meth lab at a dwelling on Convict Springs Road in Lafayette County.

To learn more about clandestine labs look for an upcoming article in Mayo Free Press.