A Summerfield couple caught Wednesday with a loaded handgun in a stolen vehicle is behind bars in the Marion County Jail.
A Marion County sheriff’s deputy was on routine patrol on U.S. Hwy. 27/441 when he saw a black 1999 Jeep with a broken windshield drive by. The deputy ran the vehicle’s tag and discovered that it was reported stolen, so he stopped the Jeep and detained the driver, 26-year-old Jarrid Miles Foss, the front-seat passenger, 28-year-old Elaina Michelle Buchanan, and another woman who was riding in the backseat, a sheriff’s office report states.
Deputies searched the vehicle and found a loaded .380-caliber Smith & Wesson semi-automatic handgun underneath the front passenger seat that had been reported stolen in Marion County in May. The backseat passenger denied knowing the vehicle was stolen and said Buchanan said something like, “Great, the gun is under my seat,” as they were being stopped, the report says.
The woman also told deputies that Foss and Buchanan were giving her a ride to the Regions Bank branch on Parr Drive in The Villages. She said the couple had been in possession of the Jeep for at least a week and Buchanan told her she had purchased the vehicle but “didn’t provide much more information,” the report says.
Foss also denied knowing the gun was under the seat. He told deputies a couple of different stories about purchasing the Jeep. He said he realized the person who sold it to him didn’t have the authority to do so and that he knew the vehicle was going to be listed as stolen. And he said he should have contacted law enforcement but didn’t, the report says.
Buchanan told deputies she didn’t know the gun was under the seat. She told deputies she is a convicted felon so she “wouldn’t have a gun.” And she denied making any statements about the gun being under her seat as they were being stopped by the deputy, the report says, adding that Buchanan was confirmed as a convicted felon out of Columbia County.
All three of the Jeep’s occupants were taken to the sheriff’s South District Office in The Villages for interviews. Foss and Buchanan were then taken into custody and transported to the Marion County Jail. Foss was charged with grand theft of a motor vehicle and was being held on $2,000 bond. He is due in court Aug. 13 at 9 a.m.
Buchanan was charged with larceny/grand theft of a firearm and possession of a weapon or ammunition by a convicted felon. She was being held on $12,000 bond and her next court date hasn’t yet been set, jail records show.
Foss is no stranger to the Marion County legal system, having been held in the jail seven times since December 2010. During those arrests he’s faced charges of possession of cocaine, possession of marijuana less than 20 grams, obtaining food with intent to defraud and violating his probation on the possession of cocaine charge.
