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Department of Justice United States Attorney David L. Huber Contact: Sandy Focken |
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July 22, 2008
“CRACK” DEALER SENTENCED TO SIX YEARS AND FIVE MONTHS
– $1,169 seized in search from previously convicted dealer
BOWLING GREEN, KY - Joseph E. Haskins, age 25, of Glasgow, Kentucky, was sentenced on July 21, 2008, to 6 years and 5 months imprisonment in United States District Court, Bowling Green, Kentucky, for drug trafficking, David L. Huber, United States Attorney for the Western District of Kentucky, and Paul Vido, Special Agent in Charge of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF), Louisville Field Division, jointly announced. Haskins, previously convicted of drug trafficking in Barren Circuit Court, plead guilty on March 19, 2008, and admitted that on or about February 22, 2007, he possessed with intent to distribute five grams or more of crack cocaine. Thomas B. Russell, Judge, United States District Court, also sentenced Haskins to 4 years supervised release following incarceration. There is no parole in federal judicial system.
U.S. Attorney Huber praised the efforts of the Barren-Edmonson County Drug Task Force saying “they primarily investigated the case.” On February 22, 2007, law enforcement officers with the Task Force and ATF executed a state search warrant at Haskins’ residence in Glasgow, Kentucky. Haskins was present along with his wife. Officers recovered a plastic bag containing approximately 6.3 grams of crack cocaine from Haskins’s person along with $1,169 in cash. During the search of their residence, Joseph Haskins made numerous voluntary statements that everything there was his and not his wife’s.
Additionally, a plastic bag containing approximately eight grams of suspected marijuana was found in a master bedroom closet in a shirt pocket. Tape recorded interviews were taken at the scene. Initially, Haskins said that he was a crack user but did not sell it. Eventually, he admitted that he had sold it about ten times over the past three months.
No state charges are pending as a result of this incident, but were deferred for federal prosecution. Haskins was previously convicted of felony drug trafficking in Barren Circuit Court.
The case was prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorney Robert J. Kilmartin. The Bowling Green Field Office of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) conducted the investigation in partnership with the Barren-Edmonson County Drug Task Force, as part of ATF’s mandated mission to reduce violent crime and other threats to public safety.
This is a Project Backfire prosecution. Project Backfire is a partnership of state, local and federal law enforcement which targets violent offenders for prosecution to the fullest extent of state and federal law.
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