{"id":13808,"date":"2026-01-26T12:55:11","date_gmt":"2026-01-26T19:55:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/farmington-counselor-charged-after-stolen-gun-meth-found-in-office\/"},"modified":"2026-03-30T21:41:23","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T03:41:23","slug":"farmington-counselor-charged-after-stolen-gun-meth-found-in-office","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/farmington-counselor-charged-after-stolen-gun-meth-found-in-office\/","title":{"rendered":"Farmington counselor charged after stolen gun, meth found in office"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"Darrel
Darrel Turner, 61, of Farmington is a certified peer support counselor at Cottonwood Clinical Services, where he was arrested for having a stolen, loaded handgun on the property.<\/span>cca<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

A certified peer support counselor at Cottonwood Clinical Services, Inc., has been arrested and charged with three felonies, including possession of a stolen firearm.<\/p>\n

Darrel Turner, 61, was arrested Jan. 18 and booked into the San Juan County Detention Center on charges of possession of a firearm by a felon, a third-degree felony; receiving stolen property, a fourth-degree felony; and possession of a controlled substance, also a fourth-degree felony.<\/p>\n

\n

Timeline in cases of Gallegos and Turner<\/h4>\n

Sept. 13, 2023<\/strong>A firearm is reported stolen from the Farmington home of Leona Largo on County Road 3958. The San Juan County Sheriff\u2019s Office later identifies Andres Gallegos, Largo\u2019s then\u2011husband, as the suspect.<\/p>\n

March 4, 2025<\/strong>Gallegos enters a repeat offender plea deal, pleading no contest to possession of a firearm by a felon. The larceny of a firearm charge is dismissed as part of the agreement.<\/p>\n

March 22, 2025<\/strong>Gallegos is sentenced to enter the New Mexico Men\u2019s Recovery Program, as approved by Adult Probation and Parole.<\/p>\n

Jan. 18, 2026<\/strong>Cottonwood Clinical Services owner Kim Dutremaine contacts Farmington Police with concerns about employee Darrel Turner, 61, reporting he was exhibiting \u201cstrange behavior\u201d and had been involved in a confrontation with a client. Dutremaine tells police she found a firearm inside a filing cabinet in Turner\u2019s office and photographed it. Farmington Police respond to Cottonwood Clinical Services. Turner is detained. He initially consents to a search of his office but then withdraws permission. Police obtain a search warrant.<\/p>\n

Jan. 18, 2026, <\/strong><\/p>\n

3:09 p.m.<\/strong>Police locate a black Taurus G3C 9 mm handgun in Turner\u2019s office. The serial number matches the firearm stolen on Sept. 13, 2023. One report later refers to the weapon as a \u201c9 mm Glock,\u201d creating a discrepancy. The gun is found in a nylon holster with an 18\u2011round extended magazine. Turner is arrested and taken to the San Juan County Detention Center. During booking, a detention officer finds four clear plastic baggies containing a crystalline substance in Turner\u2019s pocket. The substance tests positive for methamphetamine. One bag weighs 14 grams and another weighs 0.7 grams.<\/p>\n

Jan. 20, 2026<\/strong>Magistrate Court Judge Erich Cole finds probable cause that Turner committed the alleged crimes. Turner is released on his own recognizance.<\/p>\n

Jan. 28, 2026 (scheduled)<\/strong>Turner is ordered to appear at 8:30 a.m. in Farmington Magistrate Court for a preliminary examination.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Cottonwood Clinical Services owner Kim Dutremaine alerted Farmington Police to concerns about Turner, saying he was \u201cexhibiting strange behavior\u201d and had \u201cgot into a confrontation with a client,\u201d according to the statement of probable cause. Dutremaine also told police she found a firearm in a filing cabinet in Turner\u2019s office and photographed it, according to the document.<\/p>\n

When officers arrived at the office Jan. 18, they detained Turner and asked to search his office. He \u201cinitially gave\u201d and then \u201cretracted\u201d permission, the report states. Turner allegedly told police he had the gun \u201cfor protection,\u201d according to the probable cause statement.<\/p>\n

Farmington Police obtained a search warrant and at 3:09 p.m. located \u201ca black Taurus G3C 9 mm handgun\u201d with a serial number matching a firearm stolen Sept. 13, 2023, from Leona Largo\u2019s home on County Road 3958 in Farmington, according to an incident report from the San Juan County Sheriff\u2019s Office.<\/p>\n

The handgun reportedly was stolen by Andres Gallegos, who was married to Largo at the time. Gallegos\u2019 case proceeded through the county court system, and on March 4, 2025, he entered a repeat offender plea deal in which he pleaded no contest to possession of a firearm by a felon. In exchange, the San Juan County District Attorney\u2019s Office dismissed a larceny of a firearm charge, court records show.<\/p>\n

Gallegos was sentenced March 22 to enter the New Mexico Men\u2019s Recovery program, which the Office of Adult Probation and Parole approved, according to court documents.<\/p>\n

From the reports, it is unclear how Turner came into possession of the handgun. When Farmington Police collected it as evidence on Jan. 18, it was in a \u201cnylon holster and had an 18-round extended magazine loaded into the magazine well,\u201d according to the probable cause statement.<\/p>\n

Turner was taken to the San Juan County Detention Center, where he was searched. A detention officer reportedly found \u201cfour clear plastic baggies containing a clear crystalline substance in Darrel\u2019s left front pocket,\u201d the report says.<\/p>\n

The substance \u201ctested positive for methamphetamine,\u201d according to law enforcement. One bag weighed 14 grams and another 0.7 grams, the statement of probable cause says.<\/p>\n

Magistrate Court Judge Erich Cole found on Jan. 20 that there was a \u201cprobable cause determination\u201d to believe Turner \u201ccommitted\u201d the alleged crimes, according to court records. Cole released Turner on his own recognizance and ordered him to appear at 8:30 a.m. Jan. 28 in Farmington Magistrate Court for a preliminary examination.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Cottonwood Clinical Services owner expressed concerns<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":13809,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[28,29,994],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-13808","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-headlines","tag-newsletter","tag-trueanthem"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13808","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13808"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13808\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":19171,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13808\/revisions\/19171"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/13809"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13808"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13808"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13808"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=13808"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}