Principal, teacher arrested for alleged marijuana cultivation, possession

JAY, Okla. (AP) -- The principal of Watts High School and his school teacher wife have been arrested on felony drug possession complaints.

Joe Weaver, 47, and Carolyn Weaver were denied bail after Delaware County sheriff's deputies and state narcotics agents arrested them Sunday following a helicopter sweep over Grand Lake O' the Cherokees in northeastern Oklahoma, authorities said.

The Weavers were booked into the Delaware County Jail on complaints of cultivation of marijuana, possession of marijuana and possession of a controlled dangerous substance, marijuana, officials said. They were scheduled to make an initial court appearance Monday.

Agents with the Oklahoma Bureau of Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs allegedly saw marijuana plants in the Weavers' yard at their Cleora resident on the north end of the lake, investigator Mike Wilkerson said.

The bureau does a "fly by" of the county each year to try to locate illegal crops, Wilkerson said. Officials also allegedly found a bag of marijuana in the couple's house, he said.

Mrs. Weaver, 49, teaches in Ketchum, a community in southeastern Craig County.

Watts Superintendent Rita Bunch said she will begin investigating the report immediately. She said she had just returned from the annual Oklahoma State School Board Association and the Cooperative Council for Oklahoma School Administration Conference in Oklahoma City. Bunch said she saw the Weavers there.

Bunch said she wanted this term to be a positive year for the small school system, which is located in Adair County near Oklahoma's border with Arkansas.

"This will be a tough one," Bunch said.