Main Line pot peddlers reveal plan

NORRISTOWN » Two graduates of a prestigious, private school had a love for money and when they dropped out of college concocted a scheme to take over the marijuana business from existing drug dealers on the affluent Main Line, their text message conversations revealed.

“My main line take over project is coming together fast. And I’m telling all my guys I never want there (sic) schools to be dry. Cause I always got pissed as (expletive) when I couldn’t find bud. But now that will never happen for the rest of my life. Cause I got u,” then 18-year-old Timothy Clinton Brooks wrote to 25-year-old friend Neil Kennedy Scott, a fellow graduate of The Haverford School, according to court papers.

“We will crush it. Once you go tax free it’s hard to go back,” Scott, who listed addresses along Barrett Avenue in Haverford, and along Jolind Road in Paoli, Chester County, wrote back.

Brooks, of the 600 block of Cedar Lane, Villanova, responded, “This last week has made me real-

ize how much I love money.”

“This message is important because it demonstrates Brooks and Scott were making long-term plans to continue selling marijuana on the Main Line. It also clearly shows their motivation was to derive financial gain from their distribution operations. This gain was in the form of tax free income,” Montgomery County detectives alleged in arrest documents.

In January, Montgomery County’s Narcotics Enforcement Team and Lower Merion police initiated an investigation of the drug trafficking organization that targeted area high schools and colleges, according to a criminal complaint filed against Brooks and Scott.

“Detectives discovered, through seized text messages, Scott and Brooks… self-described their drug organization the ‘Main Line Take Over Project.’ Their slogan ‘Main Line Take Over Project’ implies they aspired to be the sole suppliers of marijuana on the Main Line,” detectives wrote in the arrest affidavit. “These text conversations reveal their business plan to sell marijuana to students.”

The young men’s use of text messaging to blatantly discuss their plans helped authorities crack the case.

“In many cases, that is the avenue these kids, so to speak, use to communicate with each other to commit these crimes. It is because of the relentless and unbelievable work by our detectives, that they used these text messages to then gather more evidence. In some cases, with some of these defendants, we started out with just the text messages,” said county Special Assistant District Attorney Tonya Lupinacci, who prosecuted Brooks and Scott along with co-prosecutor Jason Whalley.

“(The text messages) revealed the actual intimate workings of this drug organization, where they were going to meet, how much they were going to pay, what types of drugs that they wanted. They actually revealed the entire scope of how this business, so to speak, operated,” Lupinacci explained.

The text message threads or conversations, according to investigators, revealed Scott gave advice to Brooks on how to profit from selling drugs.

Brooks: “Like I said, I’m trying to start a business and I’m learning how to run this 1 as well. As are you.”

Scott: “Just keep finding customers and we will both make more than enough money.” Brooks: “Yep.” Brooks, now 19, who was once employed by a local investment firm, made it his goal to take-over, from existing drug dealers, the marijuana business on the Main Line, detectives alleged.

“Every Nug on the mainline is about to come from you and me,” Brooks allegedly wrote to Scott in one text message.

According to detectives, “Nug” is street slang that refers to the bud portion of a marijuana plant.

In the text messages, Scott and Brooks even recalled their days as students at The Haverford School and discussed targeting students as customers from their pot sales, detectives said.

Brooks: “When you were a senior at Haverford did u ever think that you could pull that.”

Scott: “Only dreamed of it. There is a much bigger market that just a lb at each of these schools.”

Scott, who grew up in the Paoli section of Tredyffrin Township and attended Conestoga High School, graduated in 2008 from The Haverford School, where he was a member of the water polo and lacrosse teams. After graduating from the West Lancaster Avenue school, Scott attended Connecticut College for three semesters, withdrawing “after being sanctioned by the school for smoking marijuana and manufacturing counterfeit identification cards,” according to court documents.

When he left college Scott returned to Pennsylvania and briefly worked as an assistant lacrosse coach at The Haverford School, court documents indicate. Scott moved to California in 2010 and worked at a medical marijuana dispensary and also coached lacrosse there, before moving back to Pennsylvania in October 2013, detectives said.

Brooks, according to court papers, grew up in Villanova and graduated in 2013 from The Haverford School where he played squash, golf and lacrosse. After graduation Brooks attended Richmond University on a lacrosse scholarship before withdrawing from college after one semester, detectives said. Brooks, according to court papers, also was employed by a local investment firm and formerly worked as a part-time junior varsity lacrosse coach at The Haverford School.

Their text message exchanges provided insight about the operation and provided enough evidence to the point Brooks and Scott each pleaded guilty to corrupt organization charges. Brooks awaits sentencing while Scott was sentenced last week to five to 15 years in state prison.

The text messages revealed Scott and Brooks recruited and supplied so-called “subdealers” to sell to teens at such places as Lower Merion, Radnor, Harriton and Conestoga high schools and at The Haverford School. They also recruited students at Lafayette College in Northampton County, Gettysburg College in Adams County, and Haverford College to peddle the drugs, prosecutors alleged.

“Just got back from Cali, got a bunch of greens. Know anybody around Philly who might be interests?” Scott texted one of his sub-dealers, who grew up in the Villanova area and attended Lafayette College, according to court papers.

The sub-dealers, authorities said, repackaged drugs obtained from Scott and Brooks to sell it for profit.

“Scott encouraged college sub-dealers to locate new customers to offset his cost of driving to their campuses. Scott offered the sub-dealers incentives for locating new customers and making referrals. The incentives were lower prices for drugs and the opportunity to buy them on credit,” detectives alleged.