A man caught selling marijuana to local junior high school students by Santa Clarita Valley Sheriff’s Station deputies received a suspended sentence and credit for time served, according to a plea deal he made with the L.A. County District Attorney’s Office. Â
Christian Navarro, 25, of Newhall, was arrested in June on suspicion of eight charges connected to a local investigation by the Sheriff’s Station’s Juvenile Intervention Team, or J-Team.
In December, he pleaded no contest to three charges, felony violations of the state’s Health and Safety Code 11361(b) that he furnished a minor with marijuana.
He received a suspended sentence of the mid-term sentence for the crime, four years, as well as credit for 357 days in custody after he spent nearly six months in county jail, according to court records. He also was sentenced to two years of formal probation.
As the result of his plea deal, five counts of willful cruelty to a child were dropped, according to a minute order of Navarro’s sentencing hearing.
He was released from custody at his sentencing in December, according to court records available online.
Court documents obtained by The Signal indicated SCV Sheriff’s Station deputies interviewed many students through their investigations into local narcotics sales.
In the course of their conversations, an Instagram account was mentioned numerous times by students, which investigators ultimately linked to Navarro, according to court records of the J-Team’s investigation.
In a previous phone interview, Sgt. Diego Andrade said Navarro was known to station detectives from their previous investigations.
Deputies reported finding bags of marijuana, a pricing sheet, three guns, a digital scale and various paraphernalia in a search of the home where Navarro lived with his mother, according to court records obtained by The Signal.
Pictures of the evidence seized by deputies were posted to the station’s Facebook page after his arrest.
Navarro’s previous brush with local deputies resulted in a conviction from a February 2021 case involving similar charges.
In that incident, Navarro pleaded no contest to a possession with intent to distribute charge May 11, 2021, and the other charges were dropped, according to Los Angeles County Superior Court records available online.
He was sentenced to four days in jail and summary probation.
