First defendant to plead in coke ring gets 35 months in prison
Saying he found it “baffling” why a family man with no criminal record and a decent job would risk it all by getting involved with an international cocaine ring, a judge on Friday sent Anthony Davis to federal prison for close to three years.
U.S. District Judge Mark Hornak imposed a term of 35 months on Davis, 38, of Donora.
The judge said Davis, a cement factory worker with a wife and 9year-old daughter, had allowed his house to be used as a “transfer point” for a drug trafficking enterprise that ranks among the largest ever prosecuted here.
The ring allegedly was run by Don Juan Mendoza, a Florida felon with ties to Mexican cartels, and two brothers with deep Mon Valley roots, Jamie Jr. and Deaubre Lightfoot.
Federal prosecutors say Mendoza shipped cocaine from California and Georgia by RV and van to Jamie Lightfoot’s house in Penn Hills, where he, his brother and a cadre of associates distributed it throughout the region, especially
in Fayette County.
Davis is the first of 39 people under indictment in the case to plead guilty and the first to be sentenced. He pleaded guilty to possession of cocaine with intent to deliver.
An FBI task force said Davis allowed the ring to store weapons, drugs and cash at his house for use by his friend Brandon Thomas, described as a midlevel dealer for the Lightfoots.
Defense and prosecution attorneys sparred over the seriousness of his crime, with his lawyer, Christy Foreman, arguing for probation and Assistant U.S. Attorney Timothy Lanni asking for 54 months in prison.
Ms. Foreman said Davis is “an ordinary man” who got himself “wrapped up with the wrong crowd” but didn’t deserve jail.
“Ordinary people do not belong in a federal prison,” she said.
Mr. Lanni countered that a wiretap of Thomas’ phone and other evidence clearly showed Davis was part of the conspiracy. Davis had told the judge that Thomas, his lifelong friend, had asked him to let him use his house for storage but that he didn’t really know what was going on. He also said he got nothing out of it.
“I didn’t make no money out of this,” he said. “I take full responsibility for what happened. I made a bad decision.”
Mr. Lanni said Davis’ claim of ignorance was “an outright lie.”
He read transcripts of wiretapped conversations between Davis and Thomas that revealed them talking in code about drugs and money. He also said the FBI seized $11,000 in cash from his house, along with a hydraulic cocaine press and rifles, shotguns and pistols. He said Davis was a willing participant in a major drug ring, not an innocent dupe.
“At the end of the day, it’s about money,” Mr. Lanni said. The judge agreed. While he said Davis got points for his longtime employment at Therm-O-Rock and not previously getting into trouble, he said he couldn’t look past his role in the ring or why he was willing to place his family and neighbors in harm’s way by using his home as a stash house.
“That’s something you’ll have to sort out,” the judge said.
Davis, who remains free on bond, has until Aug. 2 to report to federal prison.
The Mendoza network was massive by any scale.
In terms of sheer volume of cocaine, it is rivaled by only one or two other rings prosecuted in the history of this federal district, which covers 25 counties.
The FBI and its police partners worked on the investigation for two years. The case became public in November when agents and state police watched as members of the conspiracy arrived at Jamie Lightfoot’s house in an RV hauling 52 kilos of cocaine, 85 pounds of marijuana and an AK-47.
Agents had tracked the RV, owned by Mendoza’s mother, from Los Angeles as it drove across the country to Penn Hills.
Agents said other coke trips were made from Atlanta using a van that featured promotional pictures of Mendoza’s wife, Charlene Mendoza, a rapper who goes by “Sno-Cold.”