Police find pills, children in Ironton hotel room

A West Virginia doctor has been arrested in Ironton after he and his girlfriend were late checking out and police found a large quantity of prescription pills in their hotel room.

Around 4 p.m. Wednesday, the Ironton Police got a call from the Holiday Inn about a woman who had rented a room for three days and was supposed to check out at 11 a.m. When employees went to the room to get them to leave or pay for another day, the guest refused, saying they were packing their things into a car.

Employees could smell marijuana when the woman opened the door.

“They asked us for our assistance to remove them from the property, because at that time they were criminally trespassing,” said Ironton Interim Police Chief Joe Ross. “We could also smell marijuana, it was quite distinct.”

Ross said that when the woman opened the door, they noticed a lot of pills and paraphernalia in plain view, as well as an 11-year-old girl who was holding a five-month-old baby.

Inside the room, police said they found Dr. Marc J. Spelar, 35, who has a business in Milton, West Virginia called Prometheus Mentis Psych PLLC, and his girlfriend, Melissa H. Jones, 39, of Ashland, Kentucky.

“There was drugs, drug paraphernalia, and needles and spoons in plain sight in the bathroom,” Ross said.

Ross said they began gathering evidence.

“There were numerous prescription pill bottles with other people’s names on them, there were two or three prescription pads that Spelar had on him,” Ross said. “There were six to eight prescriptions that he had written that had not been filled. There was Suboxone strips, there was Xanax. There were a whole lot of pills.”

Police said the pill bottles were from Florida, Kentucky, West Virginia and Ohio, and were not in the name of either Spelar or Jones.

Other items included marijuana, a powder that field-tested positive for cocaine, drug paraphernalia like digital scales, new and used syringes, a steel straw and a water pipe.

Ross said Spelar had recently filled numerous prescriptions in Ironton, Portsmouth, Ashland and Huntington.

In all, the police took 52 pieces of evidence.

Spelar and Jones were arrested on 14 counts each including possession of drugs, trafficking in drugs, and child endangerment.

They were incarcerated in the Lawrence County Jail.

The 11-year-old girl, who is Jones’ daughter, was released to a relative. The baby was returned to its parents, who were helping Spelar and Jones pack up their vehicle.

Ross said that his office has already met with the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration and the West Virginia Board of Medicine about Spelar.

“We have set up a meeting for next week to go over the case,” Ross said.

Spelar graduated from the West Virginia University School Of Medicine in 2009. He has a West Virginia medical license in Psychiatry and Neurology/Psychiatry.

He was certified by the American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology in 2014 and was certified to prescribe Suboxone.

Jones has been arrested before, most recently by the Lawrence County Sheriff’s Office for drug activity in the South Point area.