Thanks to an alert witness, the Covington Police Department was able to arrest seven people Wednesday on various drug and burglary charges.

CPD spokesman Jack West said it all started when a witness saw Brian Martin, 20, 515 South Jefferson St. Apartment A, Covington drive into a supermarket parking lot on Boston Street at 11 a.m. Wednesday.

Martin allegedly used a crowbar to smash out the windows of two cars and steal numerous items from each car.

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The witness was able to get Martin’s license plate number, call the police and give detectives a description of Martin.

Police were able to locate Martin at a local sandwich shop where he works, and he was arrested on two counts of burglary.

Under questioning, Martin said he took the stolen items to an apartment on N. Pierce Street in Covington, where other suspects gave him 50 percent of that they made selling the stolen property. He told officers that he also bought drugs at the same house.

Police got a search warrant for Apartment B at 527 N. Pierce St. While police were searching the apartment, two of the men who lived there, Blake Cook, 19, and Kyle Ledford, 18 came into the house and the police took them into custody.

West said that Cook admitted to selling drugs, but said he did not fence stolen property. During the search of the apartment, police say they found materials to package drugs, a scale, marijuana and the painkiller Xanax stashed in various places around the apartment.

Cook and Ledford told police that there were other people involved in the selling of drugs.

From that information, police went to local sandwich shop and arrested Tonia Burkeens, 19, 527 N. Pierce Apartment B.

Police also arrested Jared Jones, 20, same address at his place of employment, a local restaurant. Police also arrested Jessica Sheppard, 18, as she came home from work to the N. Pierce Street apartment. St. Tammany Sheriff’s Deputies, on a tip from the CPD arrested Joshua Jones at a restaurant on U.S. Highway 59. Joshua Jones also lives at the N. Pierce Street apartment.

A further search of the apartment turned up the stolen items from the car burglaries as well as several bottles of liquor that Martin said he stole from a supermarket in Covington.

Joshua Jones, Sheppard, Burkeens and Ledford were each booked with possession of marijuana, possession of schedule IV narcotics, possession of drug paraphernalia and possession of narcotics within 1,000 feet of a school. The apartment is near Pineview Middle School. Jared Jones had the same charges, except this was his third offense for possession of marijuana.

Cook was charged with possession of Schedule I and schedule IV narcotics, illegal possession of stolen things, possession of drug paraphernalia and possession of narcotics within 1,000 feet of a school. Martin was charged with theft of the alcohol and two counts of vehicle burglary.

All seven suspects were taken to the St. Tammany Parish Jail.