Columbia father, son charged after officers find more than 100 pounds of marijuana, guns

Timothy Garrison, United States Attorney for the Western District of Missouri, announced that a Columbia father and son were charged in federal court with having marijuana with plans to distribute.

Osama Yanis, 48, and his son, Nader Yanis, 23, were charged in two separate but related criminal complaints filed in the U.S. District Court in Jefferson City.

Both Osama and Nader Yanis were charged with possessing marijuana with the intent to distribute. Osama Yanis was also charged with possessing a firearm.

Garrison said Columbia police executed a search warrant at Osama Yanis’s residence on Monday after witnessing the delivery of a crate that contained 72 pounds of high-grade marijuana. Nader Yanis was arrested during a vehicle stop after he left the residence on Woodrail on the Green.

When officers stopped Nader Yanis in his car, they found more marijuana and a small amount of white substance believed to be cocaine.

Officers had been made aware by police in Nashville of two suspicious shipments addressed to another person at the Yanis’s address. Security workers at YRC Freight in Nashville “received a suspicious piece of freight” on Friday, and called police to help investigate. When employees opened the crate, they found “approximately 50 pounds of marijuana,” according to an FBI complaint.

The complaint said employees at YRC noted a second shipment coming on Saturday from the same supplier to the address in Columbia. A drug-sniffing dog was used, and investigators found 72 pounds of marijuana in that crate.

Columbia police got involved after that, taking the second crate back to Columbia, and surveilling the home on Woodrail on the Green on Monday, executing a search warrant shortly after the FBI said Osama Yanis took the crate.

Police searched the Yanis household and found weapons, drugs and a large sum of cash. The affidavit say officers found 33 additional pounds of marijuana in a bedroom closet.

Osama Yanis told investigators that the weapons that were found were his. He also turned over approximately $19,000 that he had in his possession.

A complaint filed by the FBI claims Osama Yanis told Columbia police investigators that he kept the weapons around “after the recent drug related homicide of Augustus Roberts.” Roberts was killed in December on Lasso Circle. Columbia police have said the incident was drug-related, but have not arrested a suspect yet.

They both are currently in the Cole County Jail.