Pilot with 230 lbs. of Weed Lead Police on Wild Chase

It must have looked like a cross between the Keystone Cops and a World War I movie, as a small airplane, full of weed, was being chased by police as it tried to land in several small Texas towns.

The 64-year-old pilot, Wayne Douglas Brunet was being monitored by federal agents because of his “irregular flight pattern” from Oregon to Texas.

When federal agents attempted to stop Brunet as he neared an unmanned airport in Bulverde, a small town north of San Antonio, he saw them and kept flying toward a different airport in Lago Vista, near Austin.

The problem was, the cops were also waiting there to greet him.

So, he decided to abort his second landing attempt in Lago Vista and scoot over to an airport in Llano, Texas.

By the time Brunet got to the Llano Municipal Airport, it was nearly midnight.

He brought his aircraft to a stop, jumped out, tossed a large duffel bag and his cellphone into the grass and took off running.

But, sadly for Brunet, he was apprehended on the tarmac by the Texas Department of Public Safety Air Unit.

Authorities recovered the duffle bag and phone. But inside his plane, however, they found 15 more duffel bags filled with vacuum-sealed packages of weed and $6,000 in cash.

The Department of Homeland Security Customs and Border Protection (CBP) Air and Marine Operation Center (AMOC) apparently were tracking the single-engine plane shortly after it took off from Medford, Oregon for Texas. It had landed only once in Holbrook, Arizona to refuel.

According to the U.S. Attorney’s Office in the Western District of Texas, Brunet is being charged with possession of marijuana with intent to distribute. He faces between five and 40 years in federal prison.