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Saturday, March 19, 2011

Pennsylvania - WEST CHESTER –Jury deliberates on fate of two members of the Outlaws Motorcycle Gang

OFF THE WIRE
MICHAEL P. RELLAHAN
 timesherald.com

WEST CHESTER – Jury deliberations in the trial of two members of the Philadelphia chapter of the Outlaws Motorcycle Gang began late Thursday, with the prosecution urging the panel members to use common sense to convict the men of taking part in a $5 million methamphetamine drug ring.
“When you begin your deliberations you are not going to find that the Commonwealth bamboozled you,” said Assistant Attorney General Andrew Rongaus in his closing. “You are going to find that they are drug dealers.”
On trial are Jeffrey J. "Death Row" Hampton, 37, of Berlin N.J., and Charles D. "The Panhead" Rees, 55, of Norristown, who were among dozens of men and women charged in August 2008 as part of a state Attorney General's Office drug investigation known as "Operation Ice Breaker."
In the months since, dozens of the 40 suspected drug dealers arrested in the operation have pleaded guilty before Judge Howard F. Riley Jr., and are either awaiting sentencing or have been sentenced. But Hampton and Rees, who is acting president of the Outlaws, have steadfastly maintained their innocence.
Attorneys for the men told the jury in their losing arguments that the authorities had overstepped themselves when they thought they could tie the Outlaws to the drug ring, the leaders of which have already pleaded guilty and, in some cases, been sentenced. Rees was the acting president of the Outlaws, while Hampton served as his right-hand man.
Defense attorney J. Michael Farrell of Philadelphia, representing Hampton, said that state drug investigators believed they had “hit the jackpot” when they found that Hampton was buying drugs from William Lees, the drug ringleader. Farrell described his client as a drug addict and abuser, but not a drug dealer, as the prosecution contended.
“They thought they were building a mountain, a glamorous mountain,” Farrell said of the state Bureau of Narcotics Enforcement. “But it turned out to be an anthill.”
Rees, who owns an auto mechanics shop in Norristown, had no connection to the drug ring at all except for occasionally buying meth, said his attorney, James Freeman of Phoenixville. He mocked the prosecution’s attempt to show that telephone conversations he had with Hampton were evidence of drug dealing, and said the reason the authorities arrested him was his leadership in the Outlaws.
“They want you to believe that he did something because he was a member of that organization,” Freeman told the jury. “If he was a member of the Kiwanis, or Lions, or Rotary, would they believe they same thing?”
The seven men and five women on the jury began their deliberations about 4 p.m. after being charged by Judge Hoard F. Riley Jr., who presided over the nine-day trial.
Hampton is charged with more than 230 counts of possession with intent to deliver a controlled substance, conspiracy, dealing in unlawful proceeds, illegal use of a communications facility, and corrupt organization. Rees faces only 20 counts.
As promised when the trial began last week, much of the evidence in the case was recordings of wiretapped phone conversations between Hampton and a Philadelphia meth dealer named William Lees. Timothy J. Deery, the state Bureau of Narcotics Investigation agent who led the investigation into the massive drug ring, which saw drugs shipped from Latin America to Philadelphia, lead them through the maze of drug jargon they would hear.
Deery said that references by the men to “the Daily News” and “Cadillacs” were code words for small and large shipments of meth. The conversations were disguised so as to not refer directly to drugs, Rongaus said, so that the men could theoretically escape detection.
To back up the case, Lees testified for the prosecution and confirmed that what he was talking about was drugs. Rongaus asked the jurors to take both his testimony and the recorded conversations together as evidence of the men’s participation in the ring.
“We are not asking you to buy something that is not there,” he said. “Use your common sense and your life experience. It’s not hard to figure out what’s going on here. It’s not rocket science.”
When the arrests in the case were announced in August 2008, then-Attorney General Thomas Corbett, now governor, heralded the busts. "We have not only taken down the main meth dealers in the region, but we have also arrested the leaders and key members of the Philadelphia Chapter of the Outlaws Motorcycle Gang," he said.
According to authorities at the time of the arrests, Lees was supplied with approximately two to four pounds of crystal methamphetamine per month. He had about 55 individuals in his distribution network, who he supplied with multi-ounce to multi-gram quantities of crystal methamphetamine.
From September 2008 to March 2009, Lees allegedly distributed approximately 28 pounds of crystal methamphetamine with an estimated street value of $2.5 million.
The meth was eventually redistributed throughout Philadelphia, Montgomery, Bucks and Chester counties, as well as in Camden and Burlington counties in New Jersey. As the investigation progressed, agents learned that Lees was distributing crystal methamphetamine to several members of the Outlaws, including Hampton.
The meth was then redistributed among gang members in southeastern Pennsylvania and New Jersey. In addition to crystal methamphetamine, Hampton and other members of the Outlaws allegedly also distributed more than $200,000 worth of crack cocaine.