A Texas man pleaded guilty Friday to selling designer drugs manufactured in Kansas, U.S. Attorney Barry Grissom said.
Michael Myers, 36, Montgomery Texas, pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute controlled substances and one count of conspiracy to commit mail fraud.
Myers was indicted in April 2014 along with co-defendants Tracy Picanso and Roy Ehrett, the owners of an Olathe-based business that produced and sold dangerous controlled substances and controlled substance analogs of THC (the active ingredient in marijuana) and methcathinones (stimulants). Picanso and Ehrett are scheduled for sentencing April 18, 2016.
Picanso and Ehrett sold products to distributors under names including Pump It, Head Trip, Black Arts, Grave Digger, Voodoo Doll and Lights Out. Some of the counterfeit drugs were manufactured in buckets with drill-powered immersion mixers and tried out on “testers” who helped tweak the recipes.
Myers and co-defendant Michelle Reulet lived together in Houston, Texas, and owned and operated Bully Wholesale, an independent wholesaler and distributor of products purchased from Picanso and Ehrett.
Ehrett routinely traveled from Kansas City to Houston to pick up cash from Reulet and Myers. On at least two occasions Myers met Ehrett in Oklahoma to transfer in excess of $100,000 cash to him. Investigators collected emails and text messages exchanged among the defendants. In an October 2011 email, for instance, Myers claimed the fake weed he was selling would not show up on a drug test. In a January 2012 email to Ehrett, Myers says he and Reulet were buying $600,000 to $900,000 worth of products each month from Ehrett and Picanso.
Sentencing is set for Jan. 25, 2016. Both parties have agreed to recommend a sentence of seven years in federal prison and a civil forfeiture of more than $1.3 million.
Grissom commended the Drug Enforcement Administration, the Food and Drug Administration – Office of Criminal Investigations, the Department of Homeland Security, Homeland Security Investigations, Customs and Border Protection, the FBI, the Overland Park Police Department, the Johnson County Sheriff’s Office, the Olathe Police Department, the St. Joseph Police Department and the Buchanan County Drug Strike Force, Assistant U.S. Attorney Tanya Treadway and Assistant U.S. Attorney Tony Mattivi for their work on the case.