Sunday, May 19, 2013

Home
Man Sentenced to 27 Years for Cocaine Trafficking
Kansas City, MO resident convicted in Anchorage in November 2011
By KTVA CBS 11 News


ANCHORAGE - On Monday, May 14, 44-year-old Kansas City, Missouri, resident Thomas M. Riley was sentenced in federal court in Anchorage to 27 years in federal prison for possessing cocaine with intent to distribute and being a felon in possession of a firearm.

According to the U.S. Attorney's office, Riley was mailing packages of cocaine from Texas to Alaska since 2008. In April of 2009 investigators seized a package containing $29,100 in cash Riley attempted to mail to Kansas City. The next month they apprehended another package with $73,520 in $20 bills Riley was trying to mail to Texas.

Shortly after, investigators seized a six-pound package with two kilograms of cocaine inside from a P.O. Box linked to Riley, and found postal records showed this package weighed about the same as 18 packages previously received at the same P.O. Box.

Riley was arrested on May 12, 2009, and agents found a loaded Smith & Wesson 9mm inside a 2007 Ford Taurus owned by Riley, along with an Express Mail parcel containing $110,746 destined for Kansas City. Authorities also seized two other vehicles from a storage facility in Kansas City that the jury determined to constitute drug proceeds.

Along with the 27-year sentence, Riley had to forfeit the three vehicles and $215,629 in cash, and was ordered to pay a judgment of $396,000 - what the U.S. Attorney's office calls a "conservative estimate" of Riley's profits from trafficking 22 kilograms of cocaine in Alaska.