Monroe County Man Sentenced To More Than 11 Years In Prison For Role In Heroin Conspiracy

SCRANTON—The United States Attorney’s Office for the Middle District of Pennsylvania, announced that Myron Owens, age 31, of East Stroudsburg, was sentenced yesterday by Senior U.S. District Court Judge James M. Munley to 140 months’ imprisonment and four years on supervised release for his role in a Monroe County-based conspiracy that was responsible for distributing between 100 and 400 grams of heroin and cocaine.

According to United States Attorney David J. Freed, Owens previously pleaded guilty to committing the offense between 2012 and 2015. Owens admitted to conspiring with others to obtain the drugs from a supplier in Patterson, New Jersey, and the drugs were then transported to Monroe County and sold to sub-distributors and customers. The amount of heroin distributed by the conspiracy was equivalent to approximately 4,000-16,000 retail bags of heroin.

In imposing the sentence, Judge Munley noted the dangerous impact of heroin trafficking on the people of our communities.

Owens was one of seven people charged by a federal grand jury in a superseding indictment in March 2015. The others charged—Eddie Pace, Shawnette Isaac, Daryl Trent, William Young, Catherine Abbey, and Anton Woodson—all previously entered guilty pleas in the case. Trent received a 90-month prison sentence. Woodson was sentenced to 63 months’ imprisonment. Isaac received a 30-month prison sentence. Abbey was sentenced to one year in prison. Pace and Young are awaiting sentencing.

The case was investigated by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Pennsylvania State Police, and local police from Monroe County. Assistant U.S. Attorney Francis P. Sempa prosecuted the case.

This case is part of Project Safe Neighborhoods (PSN), a program bringing together all levels of law enforcement and the communities they serve to reduce violent crime and make our neighborhoods safer for everyone. The Department of Justice reinvigorated PSN in 2017 as part of the Department’s renewed focus on targeting violent criminals, directing all U.S. Attorney’s Offices to work in partnership with federal, state, local, and tribal law enforcement and the local community to develop effective, locally-based strategies to reduce violent crime.

This case was also brought as part of a district wide initiative to combat the nationwide epidemic regarding the use and distribution of heroin. Led by the United States Attorney’s Office, the Heroin Initiative targets heroin traffickers operating in the Middle District of Pennsylvania and is part of a coordinated effort among federal, state and local law enforcement agencies to locate, apprehend, and prosecute individuals who commit heroin related offenses.

This prosecution is also part of an extensive investigation by the Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Force (OCDETF).  OCDETF is a joint federal, state, and local cooperative approach to combat drug trafficking and is the nation’s primary tool for disrupting and dismantling major drug trafficking organizations, targeting national and regional level drug trafficking organizations and coordinating the necessary law enforcement entities and resources to disrupt or dismantle the targeted criminal organization and seize their assets.

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