Man charged for a second time with growing pot in his kids’ closet

A Raleigh resident was arrested Thursday and accused of running a marijuana-growing operation in his children’s bedroom closet with the door unlocked.

The charges against 29-year-old Anthony Joseph Cottle sound just like ones that Cary police filed against him in 2016. That’s because they are, just in a different jurisdiction.

Raleigh police said in their arrest paperwork that when they went to Cottle’s rented home on Pinecrest Road about midday, they found pot plants, loose marijuana and a growing area with filtered water, special lights, exhaust fans, reflective sheeting and a kit for testing soil or water acidity.

All of it was in an unlocked bedroom closet to which three kids under 16 could get access, police said in misdemeanor child-abuse charges. They did not give the children’s ages.

In May 2016, Cary police went to the townhouse where Cottle lived on Maynard Summit Way because emergency operators got a 911 call from there and then the phone was hung up. Operators suspected a child had been playing with a phone, but police always check on 911 hangups.

After a 4-year-old boy opened the door to a female police officer and the officer asked whether anyone else was home, the boy led her upstairs to where he said he had been playing on his bed and twin 7-month-old infants were in cribs, police said.

The boy said his father had gone somewhere to pick up his sister.

Cary officers said they found marijuana was on the bedroom floor and a growing operation was in the bedroom closet.

The 2016 charges were felony manufacturing of marijuana, felony pot possession and three counts of misdemeanor child abuse.

Those were the charges Thursday, too.

Records show that the child-abuse charges from Cary were dismissed in June, along with the manufacturing charge. The felony possession charge was scheduled to be dismissed if Cottle stuck to probation conditions.

Court records indicate Cottle was charged with a probation violation in May, but state criminal records do not show that he had any convictions as of Thursday.

After Raleigh police arrested Cottle on Thursday, he was held in lieu of $40,000 bail pending a first court appearance.

This story was originally published October 27, 2017 at 2:26 PM with the headline "Man charged for a second time with growing pot in his kids’ closet."