New Jersey Man Pleads Guilty To Possessing Oxycodone For Sale Illegally Obtained On 29 Trips To Florida
NEWARK, N.J. - John G. McCabe, Jr., the Acting Special Agent in Charge of the New Jersey Division of the Drug Enforcement (DEA) and Paul J. Fishman, the United States Attorney for the District of New Jersey, announced a Rio Grande, N.J., man admitted today to traveling to Florida to illegally obtain oxycodone on 29 separate occasions.
Joseph Baker, 44, pleaded guilty to an Indictment charging him with illegally possessing oxycodone with the intent to distribute it. Baker entered his guilty plea before United States District Judge Joseph H. Rodriguez in Camden federal court.
According to documents filed in this case and statements made in court:
Baker was arrested at Atlantic City International Airport on October 21, 2008. During a lawful search incident to this arrest, law enforcement located and seized quantities of oxycodone. Baker had traveled to Florida, and brought the drugs back with him the same day on a return flight to Atlantic City, N.J. Baker admitted that he intended to distribute a portion of the oxycodone seized.
Baker also admitted that he made similar, one-day round trips from New Jersey to Florida on 28 other occasions between 2004 and 2008, obtaining oxycodone which he intended to distribute on each occasion. Baker does not have a license permitting him to distribute oxycodone or any controlled substance.
Baker faces a maximum potential penalty of 20 years in prison and a $1 million fine. Sentencing is scheduled for June 14, 2011.
U.S. Attorney Fishman credited special agents of the Drug Enforcement Administration, Atlantic City Resident Office, and diversion investigators of the DEA Camden Diversion Group, under the direction of Acting Special Agent In Charge John G. McCabe, Jr. in Newark; the Cape May County Prosecutor’s Office; Egg Harbor Township Police Department; and the New Jersey State Police for the investigation leading to today’s guilty plea.
The government is represented by Assistant United States Attorney R. Stephen Stigall of the U.S. Attorney’s Office Criminal Division in Camden.
