Former Police Officer Sentenced for Trafficking Steroids, Money Laundering

PROVIDENCE – A former Charlestown, RI police officer was sentenced today to 3 years probation and 1,000 hours of community service for importing, repackaging and selling pharmaceuticals from China and elsewhere, and employing elaborate schemes to hide more than $530,000 in proceeds he netted from the sale of the steroids.

At sentencing, U.S. District Court Chief Judge William E. Smith ordered Evan C. Speck, 35, of Westerly, R.I., to serve the first 18 months of his probationary sentence on home confinement with electronic monitoring – the first 12 months of which he ordered Speck incarcerated on weekends at the Wyatt Detention Center in Central Falls.

Additionally, Speck was ordered to purchase an advertisement in the Westerly Sun to publish a letter of apology to the community for his criminal conduct and to send a similar letter to each member of the Charlestown Police Department. The letters must first be approved by the Court. Speck will also forfeit $536,000 in forfeitable assets, an amount equal to the total value Speck received from the sale of steroids and other drugs.

The U.S. Sentencing Guidelines range of imprisonment in this matter is 46-57 months. The government recommended the court impose a sentence of 57 months incarceration.

Speck pleaded guilty on November 7, 2017, to possession with the intent to distribute steroids, distribution of a misbranded drug and money laundering.

Speck’s sentence is announced by Acting United States Attorney Stephen G. Dambruch; Jeffrey Ebersole, Special Agent in Charge of the New York Field Office of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration Office of Criminal Investigations; Joel P. Garland, Special Agent in Charge, Internal Revenue Service Criminal Investigation; Shelly A. Binkowski, Inspector in Charge of the U.S. Postal Inspection Service, Boston Division; and Michael S. Shea, Acting Special Agent in Charge of Homeland Security Investigations for New England.

According to information presented to the Court, Speck had been ordering Testosterone Cipionate from China since at least the beginning of 2015, repackaging the drug and selling it to his customers under the name “TabMan Pharmaceuticals.” Speck connected with potential customers through third-party, member only web-based steroid boards. He communicated with distributors of raw products and with his customers, many of whom were professional and amateur bodybuilders, utilizing encrypted emails and varying email addresses, and through text message software that would eliminate texts after they were read.

To conceal the movement of funds, Speck utilized various money remittance services, utilizing false names to conceal his identity as both the sender and recipient of tainted funds.  Speck, his distributors of raw product and his customers utilized regularly changing intermediary nominees, domestically and abroad, to facilitate money remittances. The defendant also used crypto-cyber currency, Bitcoin, to conceal both the purchase and sales of products.

On March 20, 2017, federal law enforcement agents executed a court-authorized search of Speck’s residence and seized items associated with the receipt, packaging and resale of steroids and other performance enhancing drugs. Agents also seized labels containing the name under which Speck sold steroids, TabMan Pharmaceuticals.

Additionally, agents seized various false identification documents, ledgers, and cash. The ledgers show that from approximately June 2015 to the date of the search, Speck received $536,000 from the sale of steroids and other drugs. Investigators also seized two firearms from Speck’s residence and a loaded firearm found stashed in his vehicle.

The case was prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorneys Dulce Donovan and Mary E. Rogers, with the assistance of Assistant U.S. Attorney John P. McAdams.

The matter was investigated by the Rhode Island FDA Office of Criminal Investigations task force, IRS Criminal Investigation, U.S. Postal Inspection Service, and Homeland Security Investigations.

The Rhode Island FDA Office of Criminal Investigations task force is comprised of agents and officers from the FDA, IRS, DEA, HSI, Rhode Island State Police and the East Providence, North Providence and Westerly Police Departments.

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