Cops: Woman Shot Heroin in Bathroom, Carried Drugs into Brick Restaurant

Handcuffs (Shorebeat File Photo/ banspy/ Flickr)

Brick police arrested a woman reported by a local restaurant to have spent a long time in a bathroom stall where she was suspected of using drugs.

The incident occurred about 8 p.m. the night of June 30, said Sgt. Neal Pedersen. Officers assigned to the Selective Enforcement Team (S.E.T.) responded to the Joes Crab Shack restaurant in Brick Plaza for a report of a female customer who was possibly using drugs in the bathroom.

Three officers who were working in an undercover capacity arrived on scene, where restaurant staff told them that the female customer had been in the bathroom for over twenty minutes, possibly ingesting drugs, while her food was sitting at her table getting cold.

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The woman, who was later identified as Lindsay Oconnell, 28, of Toms River, had returned to her table by the time the officers arrived, at which point they interviewed the woman. Officer Puccio went to the bathroom with management and checked for any signs of drug use. In the bathroom, he located numerous empty wax paper packets that had contained heroin in the stall that Oconnell had been in, Pedersen said.

While Officers spoke to Oconnell, it was determined that she had several other drugs in her possession, Pedersen said. Oconnell had fifty wax folds of heroin, four hypodermic needles, four clonazepam pills and thirteen Xanex pills, according to police.

Oconnell, police said, also had nine large white paper folds with white powder residue inside and a plastic container with an unknown brown substance inside. The powdery substances will be tested to determine what they contain. The investigation revealed that Oconnell had ingested heroin in the bathroom stall and discarded the used packages in the stall, said Pedersen.

Oconnell was arrested and transported to headquarters where she was charged with possession of drugs, possession of drug paraphernalia and possession of hypodermic needles. She was processed and released on a summons.