Lawrence Man Pleads Guilty to Participating in Fentanyl Trafficking Conspiracy

            Concord – United States Attorney Scott W. Murray announced that Jepherson Emanuel Cabrera, 18, of Lawrence, Massachusetts, pleaded guilty to participating in a conspiracy to distribute over 400 grams of fentanyl.

            According to court documents and statements made in court, a drug trafficking organization that authorities allege was led by Sergio Martinez, employed the defendant to sell fentanyl to customers from various New England States, including New Hampshire.  On each day that the defendant worked, the Martinez organization provided him with at least one 200-gram bag of fentanyl and expected him to sell it and return approximately $6,000 in proceeds. On more than 20 days, Cabrera sold at least one 200-gram bag of fentanyl. Cabrera employed at least one runner to conduct actual hand-to-hand transactions with customers.

            Cabrera is scheduled to be sentenced on November 29, 2018.  Cabrera faces a mandatory minimum sentence of ten years of imprisonment and a maximum sentence of life, a fine up to 10 million dollars and a term of supervised release of at least five years and as much as life.

            Thirty-three additional defendants have been charged in the fentanyl trafficking conspiracy. Cabrera is the first to plead guilty.

            “Fentanyl trafficking has caused tremendous damage in New Hampshire,” said U.S. Attorney Murray.  “In order to protect the citizens of the Granite State, we will continue to work closely with the entire law enforcement community to stop the flow of this deadly drug. It is imperative that we dismantle the criminal organizations that profit from the sale of illegal substances.”

            This investigation was conducted by the Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Force (OCDETF). The OCDETF program is a federal multi-agency, multi-jurisdictional task force that supplies supplemental federal funding to federal and state agencies involved in the identification, investigation, and prosecution of major drug trafficking organizations.

            The case was a collaborative investigation that involved the DEA; the New Hampshire State Police; the Hillsborough County Sheriff’s Office; the Nashua Police Department; the Massachusetts State Police; the Massachusetts Attorney General’s Office; the New Hampshire Attorney General’s Office; the Essex County District Attorney’s Office; the Internal Revenue Service; Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s Homeland Security Investigations; United States Customs and Border Protection Boston Field Office; the United States Marshals Service; the United States Department of State’s Diplomatic Security Service; the Manchester Police Department; the Lisbon Police Department; the Littleton Police Department; the Seabrook Police Department; the Haverhill (MA) Police Department; the Methuen (MA) Police Department; the Lowell (MA) Police Department; and the Maine State Police.

            The case is being prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorneys Georgiana L. Konesky and Seth R. Aframe.

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