Two Fairbanks Men Plead Guilty to Illegal Drug Trafficking Charges

Anchorage, Alaska - U.S. Attorney Karen L. Loeffler announced that two Fairbanks men entered pleas of guilty in federal court today in Fairbanks, for two counts of trafficking in narcotics.

Andrew Paul Newman, 51, and Jason Carl Heim, 36, both of Fairbanks, Alaska, pleaded guilty today before Chief United States District Judge Ralph R. Beistline, to charges that they conspired to violate federal drug trafficking laws, and possessed more than 50 grams of actual methamphetamine with the intent to distribute it.

According to the facts presented in court by Assistant U. S. Attorney Stephen Cooper to support the guilty pleas, the two men cooperated in shipping into Alaska for resale a parcel containing seven ounces of 71% pure methamphetamine.  When the parcel came through the U.S. Post Office in August 2013, Postal Inspectors suspected it contained illegal drugs.  They obtained a search warrant from the court, followed the parcel when it was delivered, and arrested both Newman and Heim as they were in the act of opening the parcel in a secluded wooded area near North Pole.  Electronic mail and postal records showed the parcel was the latest in a series of shipments of methamphetamine that Newman and Heim received by mail from an unidentified source in California between April and August.  According to law enforcement investigators in the case, the total value of the seized drugs alone exceeds $40,000 or $80,000 if the drugs were diluted before resale.  The value of the additional drugs Newman and Heim had shipped into Alaska between April and August would be several times this amount.   

The judge set sentencing proceedings for April 4, 2014, in Fairbanks.  Newman and Heim were ordered detained in custody pending the sentencing.

Ms. Loeffler commends the U.S. Postal Inspectors, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms, and the Alaska State Drug Enforcement Unit for the investigation of this case.