Woman Arrested After Caught Sending Marijuana Via UPS

A Petaluma woman who was trying to ship marijuana via UPS was arrested last Wednesday, according to police.

Judith Lester, 67, was arrested after she went to the UPS Customer Center at 3860 Cypress Dr. to ship a box filled with marijuana. Employees discovered the contents and contacted police. Tim Lyons, a Petaluma Police Department spokesman, said he didn’t know whether the illegal shipment was discovered because of smell or because the box was torn and said the responding office would not be available until later this week.

Lester was charged with transport and sale of marijuana, a felony, and booked into Sonoma County Jail. The exact quantity of marijuana in the box is not known, but is described as “small.”

Susan Rosenberg, a spokeswoman for UPS, said that customers who try to ship illegal substances via courier is a known problem and occurs “occasionally.”

“It’s something we are on guard for. Sometimes we get suspicious about what’s presented to us and have a layer of security measures that give visibility to the shipments,” Rosenberg said, adding that she was not at liberty to disclose how the company monitored contents of packages.