Resident pleads guilty to U.S. cocaine charge
A B.C. stay-at-home dad has admitted trying to transport 42 kilograms of cocaine from Portland, Ore., to Canada last year.
Kevin Maurice Landers, 52, appeared in U.S. District Court in Portland last week and pleaded guilty to a charge of possession with the intent to distribute cocaine.
A presentence report has been ordered and sentencing is scheduled to take place in September.
On the evening of Dec. 5, 2014, Portland police officers stopped a 2013 Nissan Quest minivan on northbound I-205 at Northeast Airport Way.
The driver, Landers, gave police permission to search the vehicle. A drug-sniffing dog indicated the presence of narcotics and officers found a hidden compartment in the floor of the van containing four duffel bags containing 42 kilograms of cocaine.
Landers, an American citizen who lives in B.C., was arrested. He reportedly told investigators that he had driven cocaine from the U.S. into Canada 20 times in the previous year and was paid $10,000 each time.
At a hearing in February, he was ordered detained in custody because he was considered a flight risk. Landers has a wife and children in B.C.
The maximum punishment for possession with the intent to distribute cocaine is life in prison and a $10-million US fine.
The charge has a mandatory minimum sentence of 10 years in prison, however there are ways an offender can qualify for relief from a mandatory minimum sentence and Landers may qualify, according to the plea agreement.
The agreement also states that if Landers demonstrates acceptance of responsibility, the government will recommend that the court sentence him to the low end of his sentencing guideline range, followed by a term of supervised release.
Landers’s petition to enter a guilty plea included two letters of reference — one from the football coach and one from a teacher at the Vancouver school where Landers’ son is a student. Landers was an assistant coach on the school’s team, and the head coach described Landers as dependable and enthusiastic. He said Landers put forth “a huge amount of effort” in coaching players.
The teacher said he was very “blessed and fortunate” to call Landers a friend. “Kevin is someone I trust, and value; I understand the severity of the situation in which he has found himself, but there isn’t a second I would not have him in my home or at my table,” the teacher wrote.