From The Tribune staff reports
BIRMINGHAM — A Blount County man was sentenced to gun and drug charges on Wednesday, April 13, after fleeing law enforcement officers.
According to the United States Department of Justice, 38-year-old Stephen Matthew Laughlin a.k.a “Country,” was sentenced to 286 months in prison followed by five years of supervised release for possession with the intent to distribute methamphetamine and possession of a firearm in furtherance of a drug trafficking crime.
Laughlin pleaded guilty in December 2021.
Law enforcement conducted a joint operation of a safety and driver’s license inspection checkpoint in Blount County. During the inspection, an officer walked to the rear of the vehicle to check the tag’s status and noticed a large metal piece obstructing the view of the vehicle tag and was in violation of Alabama state law.
As the officer was issuing a warning citation for the violation, a K-9 deputy conducted a free air sniff of the truck. When the K-9 positively alerted to the odor of drugs coming from the truck, the officer asked Laughlin to exit the vehicle so officers could conduct a probable cause search of the vehicle. Laughlin then became argumentative with the officers and fled the scene.
Officers began pursuing Laughlin, who accelerated to speeds exceeding eighty miles per hour and threw a red bag, later discovered to contain methamphetamine, out of the driver’s side window. Laughlin eventually stopped, surrendering to law enforcement officers, after running over spike strips.
During the search of Laughlin’s vehicle, officers found a PPS43C Pioneer Arms Corp 9mm semi-automatic pistol and an Anderson Manufacturing AM-15 .223 caliber rifle in a soft rifle case located behind the driver’s seat on the bench seat. The drugs seized from Laughlin totaled 997.1 grams of 94 percent pure methamphetamine.
