BENNINGTON — Two Bennington residents who were the alleged victims of a recent extortion and kidnapping plot over drug debts were arraigned in Bennington Superior Court on Wednesday for failing to show up for their scheduled hearings.
Bryan J. Kenyon, 37, of Coleville Road, was charged with three counts: aggravated assault on a police officer, escaping custody, and resisting arrest after police tried to arrest him on an outstanding arrest warrant for skipping the scheduled Monday arraignment.
He was charged as a habitual offender — an enhanced charge for defendants convicted of three prior felonies — which carried a maximum sentence of life imprisonment. Kenyon was originally charged with two other counts of fentanyl trafficking and cocaine possession, but prosecutors dropped those charges after Bennington Superior Judge Kerry McDonald-Cary did not find probable cause to support them.
Since his arrest, Kenyon has been held without bail at the Marble Valley Regional Correctional Facility. McDonald-Cary continued his confinement until a weight of evidence hearing could be scheduled, citing the seriousness of the habitual offender enhancement, his prior record and the charges related to his arrest. Kenyon has a lengthy criminal record in the state of Vermont, including multiple felonies and drug convictions.
A woman, 30, the victim in the alleged kidnapping incident, was cited with two misdemeanor drug charges and released with conditions. She is due in court at the end of October.
According to police reports, on the afternoon of Sept. 12, police received a report of a kidnapping involving the Bennington woman, who had been taken to Springfield, Mass. Investigators learned that the woman would be returned in exchange for payment of Kenyon’s outstanding $1,500 drug debt to a Springfield drug dealer. An individual working with police notified the kidnappers that the money would be paid and that they should bring the woman back to Bennington. Police were on the scene at about 1:10 a.m. on Sept. 13 when an Uber arrived with the victim and four other people in a car in front of 258 Benmont Ave.
Two individuals, Maurice Edwards, 31, and Jacquelyn Valdez, 30, were arrested dropping the victim off after hiring the Uber driver to transport the woman and themselves from Springfield to pick up the money owed by Kenyon. During Edwards’ and Valdez’s arrest, police seized from them about 8 grams of suspected fentanyl (equivalent to 400 bags), 20 blue pills suspected to be fentanyl, and 31 grams of suspected cocaine. Police also located a black and silver Ruger LCP .380-caliber handgun.