United States Drug Enforcement Administration

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. – An Olathe, Kansas, man who was on parole after spending 38 years in prison for murdering two people in a bar robbery, one of whom was an off-duty police officer, pleaded guilty to drug trafficking in federal court today. The Drug Enforcement Administration St. Louis Division investigated the case.

Robert Lucious Toney, 67, pleaded guilty before U.S. Magistrate Judge Willie J. Epps, Jr. to one count of distributing methamphetamine, one count of possessing methamphetamine with the intent to distribute, and one count of crossing state lines in aid of a racketeering enterprise (the unlawful business of distributing illegal drugs).

On Dec. 14, 2018, Toney met an undercover law enforcement officer at a restaurant in Columbia, Missouri. Toney sold the undercover officer two ounces of methamphetamine for $1,400.

Toney met the undercover officer again on Jan. 18, 2019, at a restaurant in Kingdom City, Missouri. Toney was arrested in the parking lot when he got out of his car. Officers searched the car, and under the gas tank lid found four plastic bags that contained methamphetamine and a bag that contained two grams of heroin and one gram of cocaine, which Toney was planning to sell to the undercover officer for $3,200.

At the time of these offenses, Toney was on state parole after being sentenced to two consecutive life terms plus 20 years in prison for the 1973 conviction of murdering an off-duty police officer and another customer during a bar robbery and assaulting two more customers. After 38 years of incarceration, Toney was released on parole in 2010.

Under federal statutes, Toney is subject to a mandatory minimum sentence of 10 years in federal prison without parole, up to a sentence of life in federal prison without parole. The maximum statutory sentence is prescribed by Congress and is provided here for informational purposes, as the sentencing of the defendant will be determined by the court based on the advisory sentencing guidelines and other statutory factors. A sentencing hearing will be scheduled after the completion of a presentence investigation by the United States Probation Office.

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