Notorious cocaine dealer pleads guilty in prison drug ring case
A federal inmate who was at the center of a 2008 drug investigation that resulted in the murder of a Pittsburgh FBI agent admitted guilt Monday to his role in a large-scale drug ring inside the U.S. prison system.
Robert Korbe pleaded guilty to conspiracy to possess and distribute narcotics.
He was one of several high-profile inmates indicted in Pittsburgh in 2019 after a federal investigation of a drug operation that operated inside prisons and outside across Western Pennsylvania, all orchestrated by a convict from Moon, according to federal agents.
Korbe, 50, of Indiana Township, was charged with conspiring to distribute drugs and conspiracy to launder drug money but only pleaded to a lesser version of the first count.
His earlier case made headlines when his wife, Christina Korbe, shot and killed FBI agent Sam Hicks during a raid on their house in 2008.
Robert Korbe had been set for release in 2030, but the plea will almost certainly add to his sentence.
According to testimony and court records, the prison ring sneaked narcotics into U.S. institutions by saturating bogus court papers and greeting cards with synthetic cannabinoids. Inmates cut up the paper into pieces for distribution among other inmates, who swallowed or smoked it.
The inmates paid for the drug paper with money from their prison accounts. The investigation showed that money was being transferred from those accounts to the accounts of inmate dealers and then to others on the outside.
The network also sold drugs outside of prison, distributing large amounts of heroin, cocaine, fentanyl, painkillers and suboxone.
The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration and the IRS said the ringleader was Noah Landfried, of
Moon.
Prosecutors said another key player was Michel Cercone, a former real estate agent from Sewickley, who according to phone taps worked with Landfried to prepare the drug paper and sold other drugs across the region.