Drug trafficking, money laundering nets man 14 years
Justin Lee Myers
By DEUCE NIVEN
tribdeuce@tabor-loris.com
A day of reckoning has come for a Tabor City area man who admitted guilt to drug and money laundering conspiracy charges a year ago.
Justin Lee Myers, 34, who has also previously listed an address in Myrtle Beach, was sentenced this week to serve 14 years in prison for his part in a federal drug and money laundering scheme that was centered in an area known as the “Sandpit” east of Tabor City from December 2008 through most of 2017, a Wednesday news release from Robert J. Higdon Jr., US Attorney for the Eastern District of North Carolina said.
U.S. District Court Judge Malcolm J. Howard also sentenced Myers to four years of supervised release after he served his prison sentence.
Myers entered a guilty plea on Feb. 5, 2018 to charges of conspiracy to distribute and possess with intent to distribute cocaine base (crack), heroin, Fentanyl, and marijuana, and to conspiracy to commit money laundering.
Myers was charged as part of a 22-count indictment on Nov. 19, 2017 that named eight defendants in the drug and money laundering operation.
Columbus County Sheriff’s Office deputies began responding to calls involving Myers’ drug trafficking origination beginning in December 2008 and found the “Sandpit” area involved about 25 mobile homes reached after passing through a manned checkpoint that investigators determined was used as a lookout for law enforcement and protection from rival drug dealers, the news release said.
One or two armed members of the drug group typically manned the checkpoint.
Confidential informants conducted a series of controlled purchases, and through investigation investigators learned that Myers supplied the heroin, cocaine, crack, and marijuana and attempted to launder proceeds of the drug trafficking.
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