KNIGHTDALE — A robbery that led to a manhunt and the lockdown of eight schools in eastern Wake County last week stemmed from a drug deal that went wrong, according to search warrants made public this week.

Deputies arrested a fourth suspect, Pablo Gonzalo Marcano, 25, on Tuesday evening and charged him with robbery with a dangerous weapon, conspiracy to commit robbery with a dangerous weapon, felony breaking and entering, and second-degree kidnapping.

On Jan. 30, Wake County sheriff’s deputies cordoned off an area and brought dogs to search for four men after a robbery was reported at a home at 228 Fox Run Drive in the Lizard Lick community about 9:45 that morning. The robbers were reported to be armed.

After deputies found a rifle and a pistol in a Jeep Cherokee thought to be the getaway car, officials locked down East Wake and Knightdale high schools, East Wake Middle School and Knightdale, Forestville Road, Lockhart and Hodge Road elementary schools as a precaution.

The search warrants were for the Cherokee and for a GPS unit and cellphones found in it.

In asking for the warrants, deputies wrote that the incident began when the quartet went to the Fox Run house for what the residents – Eddie Pugh and Angela Wilson – thought would be a drug sale.

Instead, according to the story deputies pieced together, three of the four men took a rifle from the car, kicked in the front door, and stole a quarter pound of marijuana. They ran back to the car yelling “Go! Go! Go!” to the fourth man, deputies said.

A deputy answering the call spotted the Jeep. It pulled into a parking lot and stopped, and the occupants fled when the deputy followed, according to the warrant application.

From the Jeep, deputies seized a .270-caliber Marlin rifle with a scope, which fit what they had been told the robbers had at the house. They also found an Airsoft pistol, the GPS and a phone.

The day of the robbery, police arrested Marcus Terrell Edrington, 21, of 204 Flowers St. in Knightdale; Ethan Jeffery Huff, 21, of 211 New Rand Road in Garner; and Iran Antonio Marcano, 23.

Deputies listed both Marcanos as living at 9700 Cypress Farm Road south of Zebulon.

Iran Marcano and Edrington were charged with the same offenses as Pablo Marcano, and Edrington was charged also with assault with a deadly weapon.

Deputies said Pugh had been hit in the head with a rifle.

Huff was charged with resisting arrest and with being an accessory after the fact of robbery.

Gallagher 919-829-4572