It was a routine traffic stop for the Wellesley Police Department, and had they not run through a series of protocols, they might not have caught a Chelsea man who has eluded the feds for 23 years.
Wellesley Police and the federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) reported late last week that they had taken Jose Mejia, 45, of 13 Beacon Pl, into custody. ICE had been searching him out for the last 23 years, and appeared pleased to finally get their man.
During the traffic stop, which occurred during the afternoon on March 22nd, officers ran the plate of the vehicle and found that it was unregistered, yet it was owned by Mejia.
When approaching the truck, officers observed Mejia – who was in the passenger seat – allegedly throw a bag of cocaine out the window.
That upped the ante.
Mejia, believe it or not, was able to produce a recent driver’s license to police that he had obtained despite his ‘wanted’ status.
Officers arrested him for the drug possession charges, and it was not until they ran his fingerprints through an FBI database that they realized who he was.
They notified ICE and the federal agency soon took custody of Mejia so he could face charges that were now two decades old.