United States Attorney
Northern District of Texas

1100 Commerce St., 3rd Fl.
Dallas, Texas 75242-1699

Telephone (214) 659-8600
Fax (214) 767-0978

WICHITA FALLS MAN SENTENCED
TO TWO TERMS OF LIFE IMPRISONMENT
ON DRUGS AND FIREARMS CONVICTIONS

Conviction Part of Project Safe Neighborhood Initiative

United States Attorney Richard B. Roper announced that Wichita Falls, Texas, resident, Alfred William Bryant, 36, was sentenced today by the Honorable Jerry Buchmeyer, United States Senior District Judge, to two terms of life imprisonment, followed by thirty years imprisonment. A federal jury in Dallas convicted Bryant in April on all five counts of an indictment charging him with conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute 50 grams or more of cocaine base (“crack cocaine”); possession with intent to distribute 50 grams or more of cocaine base (“crack cocaine”); two counts of possession of a firearm in furtherance of a drug trafficking crime and possession of a firearm by a convicted felon.

U.S. Attorney Roper said, “Federal law ensures that when an armed criminal is arrested, he’ll face swift prosecution in the federal system. Thanks to Project Safe Neighborhoods, armed career criminals are being removed from our communities and neighborhoods and locked away in federal prisons where they can spend a very long time, or as in this case, the rest of their life.”

Bryant was arrested in May 2005 when officers with the Wichita Falls Police Department executed a search warrant targeting drugs at “crack houses” in the Wichita Falls area. Bryant, a convicted felon, and a member of the Kemp Edition Passe (“KEP”), a violent street gang in Wichita Falls, was named in the search warrant as the person suspected of selling “crack cocaine” at the search location. Officers found Bryant inside a residence on Gerald Street in Wichita Falls, amidst drugs, loaded firearms, ammunition, U.S. currency and a security-monitoring system inside the residence. Bryant’s accomplice, co-defendant Carlos Rashad Gould, attempted to flee the residence with approximately 40 grams of crack cocaine in his pocket. Altogether, law enforcement seized more than 90 grams of crack cocaine, more than 20 grams of power cocaine, more than 200 grams of marijuana, five firearms and body armor from the house and from a car parked outside the residence.

Carlos Rashad Gould pled guilty in April to one count of conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute 50 grams or more of cocaine base and one count of possessing a firearm in furtherance of a drug trafficking crime. Gould is scheduled to be sentenced by Judge Buchmeyer on September 8, 2006. He faces a maximum statutory sentence of life imprisonment.

ATF Special Agent in Charge Ronnie Carter said, “This case is part of the Project Safe Neighborhoods initiative in which law enforcement and prosecutors team up to target convicted felons illegally possessing firearms. It is further evidence of law enforcement’s cooperative effort to go after the most dangerous defendants, in order to reduce violent crime and make the streets of our community safer.”

U.S. Attorney Roper commended the investigative work of the Wichita Falls Police Department and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms & Explosives. The case was prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorney Gary Tromblay and Juan Carlos Rodriguez.

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