A Belleview man was arrested Thursday after a woman saw him jump her fence and behave erratically in her yard before hiding in a wooded area.
The woman called a Marion County sheriff’s sergeant for help and added that the man, later identified as 44-year-old Michael Lawrence Delucian, “appeared to be hallucinating.”
The sheriff’s sergeant made contact with Delucian and located a hypodermic needle with red fluid in it in his right front pants pocket. At first, Delucian said he didn’t know the needle was in his pocket, then he said he found it “down the street.” And eventually he claimed he found the needle in the laundry room at his uncle’s house and put it in his pocket “for safe keeping,” a sheriff’s office report states.
After the fluid in the needle field tested positive for MDMA/Ecstasy, Delucian was taken into custody and transported to the Marion County Jail, where he was charged with possession of a controlled substance without a prescription. Delucian was being held without bond and is scheduled to appear in a Marion County courtroom on Oct. 30 at 9 a.m. to answer to the charge.
Delucian is no stranger to the Marion County legal system, having been housed in the jail 17 times since December 1995. He’s been arrested three other times this year – once in August when he spent 26 days in the facility and twice in July. His prior charges this year include grand theft, burglary, larceny, dealing in stolen property, possession of marijuana not more than 20 grams, petit theft and retail theft.