FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT
AUSA VICKIE E. LEDUC or
MARCIA MURPHY at 410-209-4885
May 18, 2010
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
DRUG TRAFFICKER SENTENCED TO 20 YEARS IN PRISON
Baltimore, Maryland - U.S. District Judge J. Frederick Motz sentenced Delvaz Saunders, age 32, of Petersburg, Virginia, today to 20 years in prison followed by five years of supervised release for conspiring to distribute cocaine. Judge Motz enhanced Saunders’s sentence upon finding that he is a career offender based on four prior convictions for drug trafficking.
The sentence was announced by United States Attorney for the District of Maryland Rod J. Rosenstein; Special Agent in Charge Ava Cooper-Davis of the Drug Enforcement Administration - Washington Field Division; and Colonel Terrence Sheridan, Superintendent of the Maryland State Police.
According to Saunders’s guilty plea, on July 17, 2008, the car in which Saunders was traveling on Interstate 95 in Cecil County was stopped for speeding. After two other occupants in the car gave inconsistent stories regarding their travel plans, a canine search was conducted. Fifty-one baggies containing approximately three pounds of cocaine base were seized from the trunk. Saunders and the other occupants were arrested. Saunders admitted that he traveled to New York and paid $47,000 to buy the drugs, and was taking the cocaine back to Petersburg, Virginia to sell it there.
United States Attorney Rod J. Rosenstein commended Special Assistant United States Attorney Christine Celeste, a cross-designated Baltimore City Assistant State’s Attorney assigned to drug cases, who prosecuted the case.