United States Drug Enforcement Administration

MOBILE, AL – Dominick Gerald Balli was sentenced on October 13, 2026, by United States District Court Judge Terry F. Moorer to 120 months in federal prison for cocaine trafficking.

According to court documents, on June 12, 2025, an Escambia County, Alabama, Sheriff’s deputy conducted a traffic stop on a Cadillac SUV traveling northbound on Interstate 65 near mile marker 64. Balli, the driver, and his passenger, co-defendant Mark Gobde, appeared unusually nervous about the minor traffic violation. Gobde also exhibited heavy, labored breathing. Based on the men’s nervousness, their suspicious and inconsistent accounts of their travel plans, their limited luggage, and other circumstances surrounding the stop, the deputy requested and received consent to search the vehicle.

While searching the rear cargo area, the deputy discovered a large black suitcase. Beneath the clothing inside the suitcase was a brown blanket. When the deputy lifted the blanket, he found a white trash bag containing ten cellophane-wrapped bricks that, based on his training and experience, he recognized as kilogram-sized packages of cocaine. The Drug Enforcement Administration Laboratory in Miami, Florida, subsequently confirmed that the substance was cocaine, a Schedule II controlled substance, weighing over 10 kilograms.

Before the traffic stop in Escambia County, Balli had agreed with Gobde to transport the cocaine in the Cadillac from the Houston, Texas, area to another location for further distribution. Gobde is awaiting sentencing before Judge Moorer.

The Drug Enforcement Administration and the Escambia County Sheriff’s Office investigated the case. Assistant U.S. Attorney George F. May prosecuted the case on behalf of the United States.

This prosecution is part of the Homeland Security Task Force (HSTF) initiative established by Executive Order 14159, Protecting the American People Against Invasion. The HSTF is a whole-of-government partnership dedicated to eliminating criminal cartels, foreign gangs, transnational criminal organizations, and human smuggling and trafficking rings operating in the United States and abroad. Through historic interagency collaboration, the HSTF directs the full might of United States law enforcement towards identifying, investigating, and prosecuting the full spectrum of crimes committed by these organizations, which have long fueled violence and instability within our borders. In performing this work, the HSTF places special emphasis on investigating and prosecuting those engaged in child trafficking or other crimes involving children. The HSTF further utilizes all available tools to prosecute and remove the most violent criminal aliens from the United States. HSTF Mobile comprises agents and officers from the Drug Enforcement Administration, the Department of Homeland Security, Homeland Security Investigations, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms and other federal and local agencies with the prosecution being led by the United States Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of Alabama.