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| On drug and other charges |
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Tuesday, March 9, 2010
By AMANDA BUCK - Bulletin Staff Writer
DANVILLE — A Martinsville man was sentenced Monday to more than 19 years in prison for distributing cocaine and other charges in connection with incidents in the Martinsville-Henry County area in 2008.
A jury in December found Carlos Santana Morris, 33, guilty of four counts of distributing cocaine, one count of using a firearm in relation to a drug trafficking crime and one count of possessing a firearm as a convicted felon.
On Monday, Morris appeared in U.S. District Court in Danville, where Judge Jackson L. Kiser of Martinsville ruled on several post-trial motions in the case before announcing a sentence.
The first was a defense motion to hold a new trial because one of the jurors in Morris’ case voiced concerns about the verdict the day after the trial ended.
In a notarized letter to defense attorney John Weber III, the juror, who was not named in court, said she tried to explain her misgivings to other jurors during deliberations, but they just wanted to find Morris guilty and go home.
Verdicts must be unanimous.
In a written response to the motion, Assistant U.S. Attorney Andrew Bassford reminded the court that the jury was polled on its verdict at the end of the trial, and each juror, including the one who wrote the letter, affirmed the guilty verdict at that time. Polling the jury, a common practice at the end of jury trials, gives each juror a chance to change his or her mind in open court, Bassford said.
Weber said Monday that although attorneys and court officials understand that, it might not be as clear to jury members.
If the juror had understood then that she had the opportunity to change her mind, “the decision might have been different,” Weber said.
Bassford argued that the juror’s concerns did not meet legal criteria to be considered by the court. The court can consider striking a verdict due to a juror’s concerns only if they involve outside influences being placed on the jury during trial, prejudicial information improperly brought to a jury during trial or a mistake in filling out a verdict form, according to Bassford’s written motion.
“A juror expressing doubt after (a verdict) is not something the court can get into,” Bassford said Monday. “... What we have is juror’s remorse at best.”
When he denied the motion, Kiser said he agreed with the government that the juror’s concerns did not meet legal criteria to strike the jury’s verdict.
“If the court system is to function at all, there has to be some finality to a jury’s verdict,” the judge said.
Kiser denied several other motions, including one handwritten by Morris that asked that he be allowed to represent himself.
Sentencing guidelines in the case suggested between about nine years and about 11 and a half years total for the four drug charges and the count of possessing a firearm as a felon, and an additional mandatory 10 years on the charge of using a firearm in relation to a drug trafficking crime.
Weber asked for a sentence toward the low end of the guidelines, arguing that Morris was not the only person involved in the crimes and that he should not be penalized because he opted to take his case to a jury rather than plead guilty.
Bassford argued for a sentence at the high end of the guidelines, saying Morris has shown no respect for the law. Morris was on probation at the time of the offense after he pleaded guilty to voluntary manslaughter in Henry County in 2007, the prosecutor noted.
Furthermore, after he was indicted on the drug charges, Morris wrote a letter asking another person to find the informant in his case and “blank” him, Bassford said.
Jail officials intercepted that letter, which Bassford said was “very suggestive that the informant should be gotten rid of.”
Kiser agreed, saying Morris’ record “doesn’t show any marked repentance or regard for the law.”
The judge also noted the serious nature of the charges. Evidence in the case showed that Morris was dealing cocaine for several months in 2008, Kiser said.
The crime had “all the earmarks of a lengthy and major operation,” he added.
He sentenced Morris to 230 months, or 19 years and two months, in federal prison and five years of supervised release after he gets out.
Given an opportunity to address the court, Morris, who was wearing a green striped jail uniform, said only that his motions, all of which had been denied earlier, spoke for themselves.
Before he was escorted from the courtroom by U.S. marshals, Morris said goodbye to six supporters. A woman with the group declined to comment after the hearing.
The Federal Bureau of Prisons will determine where Morris is held, Bassford said.
Morris has 14 days to file an appeal, Kiser said. |
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