Cedar Rapids Man Sentenced to Federal Prison for Selling Fentanyl

A man who was selling fentanyl was sentenced today to more than three years in federal prison.

Maurice Montez Tarver, age 30, from Cedar Rapids, Iowa, received the prison term after an August 30, 2023 guilty plea to one count of distribution and aiding and abetting the distribution of a controlled substance.

Evidence at the plea and sentencing hearings showed that, on four separate occasions between December 2022 and February 2023, law enforcement officers conducted an undercover operation and purchased pills containing fentanyl from Tarver.

Tarver was sentenced in Cedar Rapids by United States District Court Chief Judge C.J. Williams.  Tarver was sentenced to 37 months’ imprisonment.  He must also serve a three-year term of supervised release after the prison term.  There is no parole in the federal system.  Tarver is being held in the United States Marshal’s custody until he can be transported to a federal prison.

The case was prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorney Adam J. Vander Stoep and was investigated as part of the Northern Iowa Heroin Initiative and the Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Force (OCDETF) program of the United States Department of Justice through a cooperative effort of the Johnson County Drug Task Force and the Cedar Rapids Police Department.  The Johnson County Drug Task Force consists of the Johnson County Sheriff’s Office, the Iowa City Police Department, the Coralville Police Department, the North Liberty Police Department, the University of Iowa Police Department, and the Iowa Division of Narcotics Enforcement. 

Court file information at https://ecf.iand.uscourts.gov/cgi-bin/login.pl. 

The case file number is 23-CR-41.