The Defendant Arranged the Drug Deals while He Was Incarcerated
U.S. District Judge Martin Reidinger sentenced Alejandro Javier Chaves, 44, of Douglasville, Georgia, to 360 months in prison, announced Andrew Murray, U.S. Attorney for the Western District of North Carolina. Judge Reidinger also ordered Chaves to serve five years under court supervision after he is released from prison.
Joining U.S. Attorney Murray in making today’s announcement are Robert J. Murphy, Special Agent in Charge of the Atlanta Field Division of the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), which oversees the Asheville District Office; Gregory Forest, United States Marshal for the Western District of North Carolina; Director Robert Schurmeier of the North Carolina State Bureau of Investigation; Sheriff Chip Hall of the Jackson County Sheriff’s Office; Sheriff Robert Holland of the Macon County Sheriff’s Office; and Sheriff Quentin Miller of the Buncombe County Sheriff’s Office.
According to filed court documents and today’s sentencing hearing, in 2017, Chaves was serving a sentence in the Georgia Department of Corrections related to nine felony convictions, including convictions for trafficking methamphetamine and threatening to kill a member of law enforcement. Between January and February 2017, while incarcerated in Georgia, Chaves used a contraband cell phone to orchestrate multi-ounce methamphetamine deals with a narcotics trafficker located in the Western District of North Carolina. Following an investigation into that criminal activity, Chaves was indicted in October 2017 by a grand jury in Asheville, and was transferred to the Western District of North Carolina to face the federal charges.
In May 2018, Chaves pleaded guilty to possession with intent to distribute methamphetamine. Court records show that, while he was in federal custody at the Buncombe County Detention Center, Chaves used a phone within the detention center to orchestrate additional methamphetamine deals, accounting for another four and half kilograms of methamphetamine. According to court records, Chaves arranged the drug deals between the date he entered his guilty plea and the date of his sentencing hearing.
Chaves remains in custody. Upon designation of a federal facility he will be transferred to the custody of the federal Bureau of Prisons. All federal sentences are served without the possibility of parole.
The DEA in Asheville conducted the investigation. The U.S. Marshals Service, the SBI, the Jackson County Sheriff’s Office, the Macon County Sheriff’s Office, and the Buncombe County Sheriff’s office also assisted with the case.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Thomas Kent of the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Asheville prosecuted the case.
