On Nov. 18, two West Virginia men were sentenced for taking part in a drug ring that shipped hundreds of pounds of marijuana from California to Huntington via the U.S. Postal Service. The case was heard in federal court.
According to media reports, one of the defendants, age 44, confessed to arranging the shipment of multiple packages of marijuana from California to West Virginia between 2013 and March 2018. Once the packages arrived in Huntington, he paid the second defendant, a 43-year-old postal worker, to deliver the packages to assigned locations or to personally meet him and hand over the parcels. Federal agents discovered two of the packages at the Huntington Post Office on March 15, 2018, which caused authorities to place the postal worker under surveillance. During the investigation, agents observed him passing the packages to the 44-year-old defendant outside an area retail store.
After his arrest, the 44-year-old defendant admitted to shipping at least 100 kilograms of pot to Huntington. He pleaded guilty to possession with the intent to distribute marijuana and prohibited possession of a firearm by a felon. He was sentenced to 78 months in federal prison. The postal worker admitted to delivering at least 40 kilograms of marijuana and pleaded guilty to conspiracy to distribute marijuana. He was sentenced to three years of supervised release with 12 weeks of intermittent jail confinement. The investigation was conducted by agents from the U.S. Postal Service Office of Inspector General, the U.S. Postal Inspection Service, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, the West Virginia State Police and the Barboursville Police Department.
Defendants facing drug charges might be able to successfully fight the charges with the help of a criminal defense attorney. Depending on the details of the case, the attorney may be able to get the charges dropped or reduced.
