A 46-year-old Brooklyn man now faces drug trafficking charges after a Fort Lauderdale police dog led officers to narcotics, cash, and a firearm with a scratched-off serial number hidden inside his vehicle.
Charles Wilson Pastore was riding in a white Mercedes-Benz when Fort Lauderdale police pulled the car over. Officers deployed a sniffer dog, which alerted them to the vehicle. What they found inside painted a clear picture of a drug operation on wheels: 17 grams of methamphetamine, 3.5 grams of crack cocaine, $3,515 in cash, a loaded semi-automatic handgun with an altered serial number, multiple cell phones, and a digital scale dusted with white powder residue tucked inside a backpack on the back seat.
Fort Lauderdale police arrested Pastore at the scene. They charged him with drug trafficking and possession, possession of a forged driver's license, and possession of drug paraphernalia. He sat in jail before posting $37,000 bail on September 8, records cited by The Sun show.
Police said the volume and variety of the stash led them to believe Pastore and the unnamed driver were working together to traffic and distribute narcotics. The reason for the initial traffic stop was not disclosed.
Pastore's booking photo circulated widely because of his striking appearance, a gaping hole where his nose should have been. The cause of the injury has not been made public. But the dog that cracked the case had no trouble doing its job regardless of what Pastore might or might not have been able to smell himself.
Pastore listed Brooklyn, New York, as his home address, yet he carried what police described as an invalid Florida driver's license, a document the charges classify as forged. That discrepancy adds another layer to a case already loaded with red flags: out-of-state suspect, altered firearm serial number, multiple phones, a scale with residue, and enough product to support trafficking charges rather than simple possession.
Pastore's arrest was not an isolated win for Florida law enforcement. Just days before he posted bail, officers in North Fort Myers conducted an unrelated traffic stop that produced its own haul. Anthony Hallmon, a man the Lee County Sheriff's Office says has racked up nearly 40 previous arrests, tossed a container packed with 12 individual bags of fentanyl and meth onto the road as deputies pulled him over.
Hallmon faces charges of possession of a controlled substance, trafficking, and resisting arrest. In the same operation, deputies searched the vehicle of Andrew Awis and found a loaded AK-47 inside. Awis is currently on felony probation and prohibited from possessing a firearm. He was charged with violation of probation.
Three stops. Three suspects. Drugs, guns, and a man with 40 prior run-ins with the law still on the street long enough to get caught again.
Several details remain unclear. Police have not said why the Mercedes was pulled over in the first place, or whether the unnamed driver was arrested or charged alongside Pastore. The loaded handgun's altered serial number raises obvious questions about its origin, a federal crime in itself, but no federal charges have been reported so far. The specific statutes underlying Pastore's state charges have not been made public either.
The exact date of the traffic stop was also not disclosed. The only firm date on record is September 8, when Pastore walked out of jail on $37,000 bond.
Florida's cops did their jobs. A trained dog did its job. The system that let a man with a defaced gun, a fake license, and a backpack full of meth post bail and walk free, that part deserves a closer look.
