© 2024 88.9 KETR
Public Radio for Northeast Texas
Play Live Radio
Next Up:
0:00
0:00
0:00 0:00
Available On Air Stations

Hearing set next week in drug ring case

Brad Kellar

A court hearing is set in Hunt County next week for a local man, arrested more than three years ago on federal charges for allegedly operating a drug ring out of the Hunt County Jail.

Bobby Joe Evens, 55, of Greenville had trial scheduled in May on multiple state-level counts of drug dealing and endangering a child. But the trial was postponed and a new trial date has not yet been set. The status of Evens’ federal charges was also undetermined as of late last week.

Evens, also known as Bobby Joe Grant and Bobby Joe Grant Evens remains in custody without bond in the Hunt County Jail.

An interim hearing on the state-level charges is scheduled January 5 in the 196th District Court.

The local indictments returned by the Hunt County grand jury alleged Evens was in possession of cocaine in May and November 2010, while one male and one female child were found to have amounts of illegal narcotics in their systems in November 2010.

The cocaine possession counts are first degree felonies, punishable upon conviction by a maximum sentence of from five to 99 years to life in prison. The endangering a child counts each carry sentences upon conviction of up to two years in a state jail.

Law enforcement raids were conducted across the area in September 2011, in connection with an alleged drug ring operating out of the jail.

Evens, who was in custody at the jail at the time, is accused of using his estranged wife, a former jail employee, to continue to run his crack cocaine distribution operation following his arrest on multiple felony charges filed through the Greenville Police Department.

Hunt County Sheriff Randy Meeks said investigators with the Greenville Police Department learned Evens was using his wife to keep in contact with individuals outside the jail, while continuing to run the drug operation.

Evens is also facing a violation of his earlier parole.