Fentanyl dealing case charges

Mark Gross Jr., 26, faces nearly two-dozen criminal counts after investigation by police

TOWAMENCIN » A 26-year-old Hatfield Township man is behind bars on numerous drug-related criminal counts after Towamencin detectives conducting an investigation watched him sell suspected fentanyl to a customer during a controlled buy and later found additional evidence of his drug-dealing activities, according to police.

Mark William Gross, Jr., of the first block of Garfield Avenue — who goes by the nicknames “Mack” and “Southside,” court documents indicate — was arraigned July 29 on one count of felony possession with intent to deliver a controlled substance, 10 counts of third-degree felony criminal use of a communication facility, and multiple misdemeanor counts of receipt in commerce of a controlled substance and possession of drug paraphernalia, then jailed at Montgomery County Correctional Facility after failing to post $99,000 cash bail.

Towamencin police said that during a controlled buy near his residence, a confidential source contacted Gross via phone and arranged to purchase fentanyl, and officers subsequently witnessed Gross sell the suspected fentanyl to the customer near his home, according to an affidavit of probable cause.

Detectives said in court documents that the suspected fentanyl recovered after the buy — which was in a small stamped plastic bag also containing wax paper consistent with fentanyl and heroin packaging — was not field-tested “due to the danger associated with exposure to fentanyl, heroin and opioids,” but it was sent to a lab for testing and that Gross told the buyer that “the product being sold was, indeed,

fentanyl.”

On July 28, officers from the Montgomery County District Attorney’s Office Local Drug Task Force executed a search and seizure warrant at Gross’s residence and found on Gross a syringe and several small plastic bags consistent with fentanyl and heroin packaging, as well as an additional syringe and more bags in his apartment, according to the affidavit. Towamencin detectives said Tuesday that the bags contained an undetermined substance that was also sent to a lab for analysis.

Gross “admitted to (without any prompting or coercing by police) using syringes to inject heroin and fentanyl,” court documents state.

Police also recovered Gross’s cellphone, and after he consented to a search of the phone and provided the password to access the phone’s contents, investigators found “both clear communications and coded communications by drug customers seeking to buy controlled substances from Mark William Gross, Jr.,” the affidavit states.

Gross is scheduled to appear before Lansdale District Judge Edward Levine on Aug. 11 for a preliminary hearing.