Investigators with the Beaufort County Sheriff’s Office drug unit made a fourth arrest in what has turned out to be a four-month investigation into drug dealing in the Aurora and Edward areas.

Bobby Lee Moore, 26, of N.C. Highway 33 East, Aurora, was charged Thursday with four counts of conspiracy to possess with intent to sell and deliver heroin, possession with intent to sell and deliver heroin, manufacturing heroin, possession with intent to sell and deliver cocaine, manufacturing crack cocaine and possession of firearm by a convicted felon.

Moore’s arrest is part of the same investigation that last week produced the arrests of Aurora residents James Albert Bryant, 32, and Johnnie Alson Pender Jr., 20, and Grantsboro resident Kristin Love Jones, 22, according to Lt. Russell Davenport, head of the drug unit. Davenport said the investigation is ongoing.

“This investigation started in September of 2015 — that’s how long the investigation been going on,” Davenport said. “And there’s definitely two more that we have active arrest warrants on that we’re looking for in the area. … “I think it’s important for the people who live in the Aurora/Edward area to realize that we are down there working on the drug problem.”

According to the drug unit press release, Moore was using a vacant residence next his own residence to repackage heroin and cocaine and make crack cocaine. A search turned up heroin, cocaine, crack cocaine, digital scales, packaging material for heroin, packaging material for cocaine, equipment used to cook powder cocaine into crack cocaine, $1,583 in cash, a 38-caliber revolver and a 22-caliber rifle, the press release said.

Davenport said it was surveillance, along with controlled buys of the drugs that led to Moore’s arrest, as well as those of Bryant, Pender and Jones. Surveillance, however, can be challenging in the less populated areas of the county, he said.

“If it’s a more rural area, it’s harder for us to work,” Davenport said. “Physically, we have to get out of cars, get in the woods and have to stay still for 12-13 hours at a time so we don’t get noticed.”

Heroin and prescription pain pill sales are equally prevalent across the county, he said, and the drug unit is paying particular attention to cases involving opiates simply because of the growing number of overdoses they’ve seen.

“Some of them are dying, some of them are not dying, but we’ve been seeing a lot more overdoses because of opiates, which includes heroin and (prescription pain) pills,” Davenport said. “We’re definitely prioritizing the heroin cases.”

Moore was out on parole for a previous trafficking in cocaine conviction, for which he served almost three years in the Department of Corrections. He was confined in the Beaufort County Detention Center under a $250,000 secured bond.