After employing an elaborate scheme to smuggle drugs into a Tennessee correctional facility, a man faces over seven years in prison after one of the recipients of his smuggled narcotics overdosed and died.
“On June 8, 2023, Michael Wayne Lee, 45 of Blaine, Tennessee, was sentenced to 87 months in prison by the Honorable Clifton Corker, United States District Judge, in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Tennessee at Greeneville,” according to a news release from the United States Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Tennessee. “Following his imprisonment, Lee will be on supervised release for three years.”
According to the release, Lee was convicted of Conspiring to Distribute Fentanyl, Abetting the Distribution of Fentanyl, and Using a Communication Facility to Conspire to Distribute Fentanyl.
Lee was an inmate at the Northeast Correctional Complex, Carter County Annex (NECX) in 2020, when he used a contraband cell phone to conspire with a co-defendant, Debra Kathleen Vekasi, to smuggle drugs into the prison by hiding them in tennis balls, which would be tossed over the prison fence into the recreation yard.
“On May 15, 2020, the narcotics that Vekasi provided to the inmate in NECX included 30 fake oxycodone pills that contained fentanyl,” according to the release. “A search of Vekasi’s cell phone included text messages between her and Lee that discussed the receipt and distribution of narcotics, as well as the receipt and payment of money for the narcotics.”
That same day, two inmates overdosed on the narcotics provided by Lee and Vekasi, and one died at the hospital.
Vekasi was sentenced to more than two years after a jury conviction for her role in the scheme.
Lee’s potential prison sentence for his role in the inmate’s death is comparable to punishment for the least severe intent-based homicide charge in Tennessee, voluntary manslaughter, a Class D felony. A guilty verdict on that charge results in a prison sentence of between two and 12 years.
According to the press release, Lee’s conviction resulted from Tennessee’s Project Safe Neighborhoods.
As The Tennessee Star reported last year:
Project Safe Neighborhoods was launched in 2001 as an “evidence-based and community-oriented response to serious gun crime.” According to the DOJ, the project is a “nationwide initiative that brings together federal, state, local, and tribal law enforcement officials, prosecutors, community leaders, and other stakeholders to identify the most pressing violent crime problems in a community and develop comprehensive solutions to address them.”
According to the DOJ, the goal of the program is to “reduce violent crime, not simply to increase the number of arrests or prosecutions” by following four design elements of violent crime reduction initiatives: community engagement, prevention and intervention, focused and strategic enforcement, and accountability.
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Pete D’Abrosca is a reporter at The Tennessee Star and The Star News Network. Follow Pete on Twitter
Photo “Gavel” by sergeitokmakov.
