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55-Year sentence upheld for first-time pot dealer |
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Written by Chris Conrad
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The Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals Jan. 10 upheld a 55-year sentence
for the first-time conviction of pot dealer Weldon Angelos, 27, who had
but did not use a gun.
Angelos had no prior felony convictions but did
have a gun in his pocket that he neither brandished nor displayed
during three alleged sales totaling 24 ounces of cannabis, and was
convicted of “possessing a firearm while involved in a drug deal.”
Families Against Mandatory Minimums (FAMM) had been watching the case
because under Utah law he was convicted of three violations; the first
has a mandatory minimum five-year sentence, and each subsequent
conviction added a mandatory 25-year sentence to the total, with no
hope for early parole.
Nearly 160 ex-Justice Department officials signed onto an amicus
brief, including four former U.S. attorneys general (Janet Reno,
Benjamin Civiletti, Griffin Bell and Nicholas Katzenbach), former FBI
director William S. Sessions and numerous federal judges, arguing the
sentence was so excessive as to constitute “cruel and unusual
punishment.” |
Volume Two 
