RUMFORD – Two of eight people arrested Thursday after an eight-month investigation into cocaine trafficking, were released on bail Friday from Oxford County Jail in Paris.

Dana L. Richardson, 48, and Peter Cormier, 55, both of Rumford, each posted $10,000 cash bail, a jail official said late Friday afternoon.

Richardson was charged with two counts of aggravated cocaine trafficking and two counts of conspiracy to traffic cocaine. Cormier was charged with one count of aggravated cocaine trafficking and two counts of possessing morphine and another prescription narcotic yet to be identified, Detective Lt. Mark Cayer said Friday afternoon.

Richardson and Cormier are expected to be arraigned Dec. 5 in Oxford County Superior Court in Paris.

The other six, who were unable to post $10,000 cash bail each, remained behind bars Friday night. They are expected to be arraigned on either Monday or Tuesday, Oct. 16 or 17, in Oxford County Superior Court in Paris.

Cayer said the crimes are considered aggravated because they were committed within 1,000 feet of a school.

Two others included in the bust – Joseph Belskis, 38, and Mark Towers, 33, both of Rumford – have yet to be served with arrest warrants, Cayer said.

Cayer said Belskis, who was charged with a Class B crime of cocaine trafficking, was in the federal holding facility at Penobscot County Jail in Bangor, but a jail official contacted by phone Friday afternoon said Belskis wasn’t there.

Towers, who was charged with aggravated cocaine trafficking and accomplice liability aggravated cocaine trafficking, is serving a nine-month sentence in Kennebec County Jail in Augusta. He was convicted of possessing a firearm while prohibited and hunting without a license, a jail administrator said Friday afternoon. She said Towers had yet to be served with a warrant on the Rumford charges.

Thursday’s arrests and charges were the result of a months-long multijurisdictional investigation of cocaine distribution in the Rumford area, Rumford police Chief Stacy L. Carter said Friday morning.

The sweep began when two teams of four officers each began serving warrants on nine people indicted on Oct. 4 by an Oxford County grand jury, Cayer said.

All but Cormier and Christopher Touchette, 22, of Rumford, were warrant arrests. Touchette, who has a drug trafficking case pending in Oxford County Superior Court, was arrested and charged with a bail violation. He is expected to be arraigned on Dec. 5.

Eight months ago, Detective Sgt. Daniel Garbarini and Patrolman George Cayer began investigating Rumford’s cocaine and crack cocaine problem aided by the Maine Drug Enforcement Agency, the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency, Franklin County and Farmingon police, and the New England State Police Information Network.

“Cocaine is the drug of choice in Rumford for people that can afford it,” Mark Cayer said. Most of it, police think, comes from Massachusetts.

A gram sells for $100 in Rumford, and a 3-gram ball called an Eight-Ball, because it’s an eighth of an ounce, sells for $250 here, he said. Undercover buys were made during the investigation before grand jury indictments were sought.

During the sweep, police gained information about Cormier and went to his house to arrest him.

“He pulled up in his car, saw the officers, who started walking toward the car, and he began throwing two bags of cocaine, presumably, out of his car. At least one officer saw him do this,” Mark Cayer said.

Officers found a small bag of cocaine in the car, then obtained a search warrant for his house, where they found and seized morphine and an unknown prescription narcotic, he added.

“The emphasis on this investigation and (Thursday’s) resulting arrests is to provide a better quality of life here in the Rumford area,” Carter said in a statement.

By focusing efforts on distributors, Carter said they hope to disrupt the flow of cocaine, to allow users to break free of the cycle of drug use and seek alternatives, like treatment and counseling, to better their lives.

Mexico and Oxford County law enforcers, the U.S. Border Patrol, and the Maine Department of Corrections Probation and Parole also participated in Thursday’s sweep.