Officers make major PCP bust in southwest Mo.

SPRINGFIELD, Mo. -- A state highway trooper who stopped a tractor-trailer at a weighing station helped officials make a major seizure of the hallucinogenic drug PCP, officials said Friday.

The two people traveling in the rig had stopped for a routine inspection when the officer on duty noticed the driver had numerous violations and a suspended license.

He became suspicious and called Newton County sheriff's deputies and a state trooper to the D-4 East Weigh Station, located near Joplin on Interstate 44, according to an affidavit filed in the case.

Officers found 40 one-gallon tin cans packed with liquid PCP, also known as "angel dust," inside the car-hauler unit pulled by the tractor.

Searching a little further, the officials also found 26 pounds of cocaine packed in a dozen kilogram-sized packages in the dash of a Nissan van parked on the car-hauler unit.

The driver, Marzett L. Parker, 35, and passenger Odell M. Edwards, 36, both of Fontana, Calif., were charged Friday in federal court with possession of large quantities of PCP and cocaine with the intent to distribute the drugs, according to a statement from the Office of the federal prosecutor for the Western District of Missouri.

Officials said PCP is normally laced in other drugs such as marijuana, ever recorded.