Feds charge Morristown man with running drug house

Federal Magistrate Judge Kevin Doyle jailed Ulrich, calling him a danger to the community.

Ulrich’s criminal record includes felony convictions for unlawful mischief in 2020 and burglaries in 2013 and 2020, Doyle said. Two misdemeanors drug possession convictions both netted jail time, records show.

His detention came as the state repeatedly declined to jail Ulrich, even when he reportedly carried crack cocaine into the state probation office in Morristown during a recent check-in, officials said.

Doyle noted Ulrich also had four violations of his probation in the past two months.

It was during the criminal investigation into the theft of two handguns from Parro’s Gun Shop and Indoor Range that Ulrich and his housemate, Carlee A. Shields, 44, became prime suspects after police released a security video to the public.

Citizens soon provided their names to police.

Morristown police, which was assisting in the state police investigation, reported officers responded to the Ulrich-Shields residence on Washington Highway and determined the home was being used as a base to store and distribute drugs, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms and Explosives said in court papers.

A third person, Sharad Collier, 25, of Hartford, Conn., ran out of the house when police arrived, Morristown Detective Lt. Todd Baxter reported.

Baxter and a police K-9 tracked Collier to a neighbor’s shed, court papers note. Collier had a two-hour standoff with police before he eventually surrendered, ATF special agent Eric Brimo said.

According to Brimo, during a search of the Washington Highway home police found a Glock Model 23 .40-caliber semi-automatic pistol but it was unclear if the .40-caliber weapon was the same one missing from the Waterbury gun shop. The other stolen gun was a .22-caliber, police said.

While at the Morristown residence, Baxter and others found wax glassine baggies they say are used to package controlled substances, three bags of crack cocaine totaling about 75 grams and drug paraphernalia, Brimo wrote in court papers.

Brimo said Morristown police chief Jason Luneau, a former member of the Vermont Drug Task Force, interviewed Ulrich and learned he used both fentanyl and crack cocaine, but was trying to get clean. Ulrich denied he was running a “crack house,” according to court records.

Doyle noted that just before the court hearing Ulrich tested positive for fentanyl and cocaine and he admitted using heroin the day before. Doyle said Ulrich reported he completed Valley Vista, a residential drug treatment facility in Bradford, but apparently relapsed.

Shields has denied the theft charge in the Parro case, records show, and Ulrich pleaded not guilty to two counts of being a prohibited person in possession of a firearm.

A probable cause hearing in the federal case was set for March 30, unless a grand jury returns an indictment, in which case the hearing would become an arraignment.