Federal Prison Sentence for Man Who Helped Sell Heroin

A man who worked with others to sell heroin throughout the Cedar Rapids area was sentenced on October 17, 2018, to more than five years in federal prison.

Eddy Watt, age 28, from Cedar Rapids, Iowa, received the prison term after a June 25, 2018, guilty plea to two separate counts of aiding and abetting the distribution of heroin. 

According to information disclosed during the sentencing hearing, Watt was involved with a group of heroin dealers from at least November 2017 through April 2018.  During that time, the group had at least eighty customers and made, on average, twenty sales of heroin per day.  During the sentencing hearing, the judge described the group’s “fairly sophisticated” operation, including taking turns answering a single phone that heroin customers called to order heroin and delivering the heroin in groups of two.  The group changed phone numbers on multiple occasions to avoid detection by law enforcement.  The “stash house” where the group stored heroin was located within 1,000 feet of an elementary school.  Two additional members of this group, Rolando Brown and Garland Lightfoot, have pled guilty and are awaiting sentencing.

Watt was sentenced in Cedar Rapids by United States District Court Judge Linda R. Reade.  Watt was sentenced to 64 months’ imprisonment.  He must also serve a three-year term of supervised release after the prison term.  There is no parole in the federal system.

Watt is being held in the United States Marshal’s custody until he can be transported to a federal prison.

The case was prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorney Justin Lightfoot and was investigated as part of the Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Force (OCDETF) program of the United States Department of Justice through a cooperative effort of the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) Task Force consisting of the DEA; the Linn County Sheriff's Office; the Cedar Rapids Police Department; the Marion Police Department; and the Iowa Division of Narcotics Enforcement. 

Court file information at https://ecf.iand.uscourts.gov/cgi-bin/login.pl. 

The case file number is 18-CR-43.  The case file number for Rolando Brown and Garland Lightfoot is 18-CR-42.

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