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Johnson City man sentenced on federal crack cocaine charges

October 26, 2011 US Dept. of Justice

GREENEVILLE, Tenn. -- Michael Gay, 26, of Johnson City, Tenn., was sentenced on Monday, Oct. 24, in U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Tennessee at Greeneville, to serve 240 months in prison for his role in conducting crack cocaine sales in Johnson City.

Under the federal guidelines, Gay was sentenced as a career offender based upon a prior felony drug conviction and a prior felony aggravated assault conviction. As these drug sales were committed while Gay was serving a term of supervised release related to another prior federal conviction, the Honorable Ronnie Greer, U.S. District Judge, ordered the 24 month sentence from the revocation of his prior supervised release to run consecutive, resulting in a net effective sentence of 264 months.

In March 2011, Gay was found guilty by a federal jury following a trial in U.S. District Court. Evidence presented at trial showed that Gay assisted in the distribution of a quantity of crack cocaine to a confidential informant working on the behalf of law enforcement on two occasions in April 2010. Following the second drug deal, Johnson City police officers arrested Gay and a co-defendant during an undercover drug deal. Officers found marked U.S. currency on Gay from the first drug buy and additional quantities of crack cocaine and marijuana in the vehicle being operated by Gay and his co-defendant.

The Johnson City Police Department Vice Squad was the primary law enforcement agency responsible for the indictment and subsequent conviction of Gay. Special Assistant U.S. Attorney Ben Whittemore and Assistant U.S. Attorney Wayne Taylor represented the United States.