A 28-year-old Minnesota man will likely serve 39 months in prison after pleading guilty to the felony charge of possessing more than 3 grams of heroin. The plea agreement spared him from sentencing for another serious felony of distributing drugs that caused bodily harm.
The 2016 arrest occurred after authorities executed a search warrant at his home in Alexandria on Lark Street. His name emerged from an investigation conducted by the Fergus Falls Police Department and the West Central Minnesota Drug and Violent Crimes Task Force into the near-fatal overdose of a 19-year-old woman. Investigators alleged that he had sold her the heroin that led to her overdose in Fergus Falls on Oak Street. The woman survived after emergency response personnel performed CPR and transported her to a health care facility.
The Douglas County attorney representing the man accused of providing her with drugs said that the defendant wanted to begin his prison sentence immediately after accepting the plea deal. He chose this instead of waiting in the Douglas County Jail for his sentencing hearing on additional charges of second-degree heroin possession and selling narcotics in a school zone.
People who are facing drug charges of this nature might find it advisable to meet with a criminal defense attorney as soon as practicable so that a strategy to use before or at trial. In many cases, prosecutors have a heavy case load and thus might be willing to enter into an agreement that entails the defendant pleading guilty in return for the dropping of other charges and a reduced penalty.
Source: Echo Press, “Man pleads guilty in heroin overdose case“, Al Edenloff, Aug. 11, 2017