DOVER — During the six years Octavia Sallie-Hicks worked for the state Department of Community Affairs, she had access to dozens, possibly hundreds, of low-income residents looking for subsidized housing. One name Sallie-Hicks came across, according to a statement the clerk allegedly made to Dover detectives, was that of Lamont Walker, who moved to 72A Thompson Ave. in September...
Dwayne Hicks appears via video for a bail hearing today before Superior Court Judge Thomas Manahan in Morristown.DOVER — During the six years Octavia Sallie-Hicks worked for the state Department of Community Affairs, she had access to dozens, possibly hundreds, of low-income residents looking for subsidized housing.
One name Sallie-Hicks came across, according to a statement the clerk allegedly made to Dover detectives, was that of Lamont Walker, who moved to 72A Thompson Ave. in September 2009, thanks to a federal Section 8 subsidy that helped pay the rent.
From that two-story colonial duplex, heroin was bought, stolen goods sold and sexual favors traded, police said.
"It was a taxpayer-sponsored drug den," said Detective Sgt. Richard Gonzalez.
What role, if any, Sallie-Hicks played in helping Walker obtain the home remains unclear. She told police she had never met Walker, but he was friends with, and bought drugs from, her husband, Dwayne Hicks, a man known in Dover as ‘Homicide,’ police said.
Gonzalez said Sallie-Hicks acknowledged she and her husband lived at the home for last winter, but they moved to Morristown upon hearing authorities were watching what he called a "bustling drug den."
THE JOB
Sallie-Hicks and her husband were arrested Friday on drug charges. At a bail hearing this afternoon, Hicks, 43, admitted his guilt but said his wife was innocent.
"She didn’t have anything to do with it," Hicks said via video from the Morris County jail. "I’m guilty of the charges."
Superior Court Judge Thomas Manahan, sitting in Morristown, set Hicks’ bail at $125,000. Sallie-Hicks, 38, asked for leniency.
"I need to return to my job," she said, also via video. "I have bills to pay, and I have obligations at home. I can’t afford to lose my job over this."
Manahan set her bail at $5,000, unaware that — according to DCA Commissioner Lori Grifa — Sallie-Hicks had been fired that morning.
"We are hopeful that we screen and hire appropriate people," Grifa said, "but when their conduct is revealed to be inappropriate or criminal, then we take appropriate action."
Grifa said she has asked State Police and the state attorney general to investigate whether Sallie-Hicks used her job improperly.
Sallie-Hicks, a senior clerk who earned more than $38,000 per year, would not have had the authority to approve Walker’s application, Grifa said, though it is possible she passed it along to a supervisor.
THE HOUSE
Police raided the Thompson Avenue residence April 2. Behind the door was a bleak tableau — 13 people, including three teenage girls, were clustered in a 12-by-6-foot living room, where they were lying on ragged couches or the dirty floor. The home stank of sweat and burnt marijuana. An open stove served as the only source of heat.
Police said they made 11 arrests in connection with the home, including Walker and Derrick Hicks, Sallie-Hicks’ brother-in-law. The pair, authorities said, were middlemen who allegedly bought heroin, keeping some for themselves and selling the rest.
Walker told police he set up in Dover because the rent was cheap, and that Dwayne Hicks was his lead supplier, Gonzalez said.
THE ARREST
Police said they then monitored Hicks for weeks. On Friday, Gonzalez said, detectives saw him leave a Prospect Street residence and enter the passenger side of a van. Sallie-Hicks was in the driver’s seat, police said.
"I know you guys are looking for me," Hicks told the detectives, according to police. "Here, this is all I have. I’m not going to give you any problems."
Hicks, Gonzalez said, handed police several packages of heroin, 58 glassine folds and one Suboxone pill, a narcotic used to treat an opiate addiction.
Sallie-Hicks told police she knew her husband was delivering drugs, Gonzalez said.
She was charged with possession of heroin, conspiracy to distribute heroin and conspiracy to distribute heroin within a park zone. She was issued a summons in connection with allegedly possessing a controlled dangerous substance in a motor vehicle.
Hicks was charged with possession with the intent to distribute more than a half ounce of heroin, possession of heroin, possession of heroin within the intent to distribute it within a park zone, possession of the prescription drug Suboxone, conspiracy to distribute heroin and conspiracy to distribute within a park zone.
Staff writer Ben Horowitz contributed to this report.