Feds take gun and $12K from Wichita man who left drug house with marijuana and meth

A Kansas man is headed to federal prison for more than 12 and a half years after police caught him with a gun, drugs and money during a traffic stop in south Wichita.

Valentine Elfredo Solis, 38, was sentenced in U.S. District Court on Tuesday to 151 months in federal prison. He pleaded guilty in October to possession with intent to distribute methamphetamine and possession of a firearm by a prohibited person.

Federal prosecutors were also granted a preliminary order of forfeiture in December, allowing the government to keep a Ruger 9 mm handgun, ammunition and about $12,811 seized from Solis.

The incident happened on Aug. 3, 2018, according to a narrative in the plea agreement. Two Wichita Police Department officers pulled over and arrested Solis, and a search of the vehicle turned up a backpack with a pistol, cash, drugs and drug paraphernalia — including a digital scale, a ledger and baggies. Forensic testing determined the drugs were meth and marijuana.

The ledger included over $75,000 in drug sales, court documents state, and Solis is a documented gang member.

Solis was intending to distribute the drugs, he admitted in his plea, and the nearly $13,000 seized by police was drug proceeds. As part of the plea deal, an additional charge of possession of a firearm in furtherance of a drug-trafficking crime was dismissed.

The case is not yet over in court, though. Solis’s defense attorney, Wichita lawyer Mark Schoenhofer, filed a notice of appeal. He is challenging the judge’s denial of a motion to suppress evidence based on alleged constitutional rights violations.

District Judge Eric Melgren’s ruling states that the incident started with undercover surveillance of a suspected drug house in the 1700 block of West Walker Street. The undercover cop saw a man — later identified as Solis — leave the house in a purple Dodge Charger. Uniformed officers Vincent Reel and Jonathan Estrada later pulled over the Charger for an alleged traffic violation when the driver changed lanes without using a turn signal.

The traffic stop happened in the parking lot of the Lost Sock Laundromat at the corner of Seneca and McCormick. The judge wrote that Reel’s body camera footage showed Solis partially exit the vehicle before leaning back into the car and reaching for something. The officers drew their guns and demanded that Solis get out with his hands up, which he did after the commands were issued multiple times.

As he got out of the car, he locked the door and tried to hide the keys, the judge wrote. Solis appeared to conceal something in his hand before tossing it under the car. Officers later found the marijuana cigarette. Officer Reel alleged that he smelled marijuana in the car, and the cops used that as probable cause to search the vehicle. The evidence of the crimes was found in a backpack inside the car.

Schoenhofer’s filing claims the traffic stop, arrest and search were illegal. He suggested Reel never smelled marijuana, that no traffic violation had occurred and that body camera video showed Reel lied in his report, among other allegations. Assistant U.S. Attorney Ryan McCarty argued that “an over-zealous defense attorney” intentionally lied in the motion, was “deliberately attempting to mislead the Court” and was “making reckless allegations against a police officer.”

The judge sided with prosecutors that Solis’s Fourth Amendment rights were not violated during the incident.

Kansas Department of Corrections records show Solis, who is also known as the aliases “Smoky,” “Carlos” and “Val,” has a criminal history. He has 19 prior convictions in Sedgwick County since 2002, including theft, burglary, flee and elude, drug crimes and gun charges. His most recent sentence expired in April.

This story was originally published February 9, 2020 at 5:02 PM.