Florida Man Sentenced to 25 Years for Selling Four Bottles of Painkillers to Informant
I’m a little late to this story, but it’s (seemingly) crazy enough that it’s worth addressing. A fellow in Florida named John Horner was 46 years old and had been legitimately prescribed some painkillers after losing an eye in an accident. A few years later, he sold four bottles of apparently left over painkillers to someone who turned out to be a government informant. The informant had befriended Horner and pretended to be in pain. The informant claimed that he could not pay for both his rent and his prescriptions to handle the pain. So Horner sold him pills. Horner’s record, apparently, consisted of a 28-year-old conviction for statutory rape at age 18. His sentence for selling the painkillers? A mandatory 25 years, minimum.
That’s disturbing enough on its face, but also disturbing is what the officials told him after he was arrested: give us five more guys like you and we’ll reduce the sentence to 10 years:
Under the deal he signed with prosecutors, he agreed to plead guilty. But if he helped make prosecutable cases against five other people on drug-trafficking charges – charges carrying 25-year minimum terms – his own sentence could be reduced from 25 years to 10.
I’m disturbed by the idea that one can cut their sentence so drastically, but only if they successfully make out a specified number of other prosecutable cases. Making a deal with someone on condition that they tell the truth can be appropriate. Making a deal with someone on condition that they cooperate with you in trying to solve crimes can be appropriate. But I’m bothered by the existence of a quota. To me, that creates an incentive for someone to cut corners or go over the top. Which, just from the description of Horner’s case, appears to have happened to him. Having someone approach you claiming they are in pain and that they can’t pay for their pills is a pretty aggressive approach.
By the way, Horner made the deal, but couldn’t come through:
Horner failed to make cases against drug traffickers.
As a result, he was sentenced to the full 25 years in October last year and is now serving his sentence in Liberty Correctional Institution, outside Tallahassee. He will be 72 by the time he is released.
He has three young kids.
I often find that stories about crimes leave out details that make the defendant seem less sympathetic, and that may be the case here. I have contacted the Osceola County Attorney to ask them about the case, and if they tell me anything of interest, I will let you know. It’s hard to imagine what they could say that would make me feel right about this guy getting sent away for 25 years, but you never know unless you ask.
Ding.
Patterico (2efd47) — 4/7/2013 @ 10:09 amwe do not live in a country what prizes freedom very highly
happyfeet (8ce051) — 4/7/2013 @ 10:11 am“Your concerns are very important to the County and your question has been routed to the appropriate department for action. You can monitor the status of your question by clicking the link below.”
Patterico (2efd47) — 4/7/2013 @ 10:17 amWithout any sense that he regularly sold drugs, this is astoundingly disproportionate.
SPQR (768505) — 4/7/2013 @ 10:25 amEver since the Schiavo execution I’ve sort of regarded FL as our own little piece of Pakistan.
gary gulrud (dd7d4e) — 4/7/2013 @ 10:28 amI am very anti-drug use–But this is immoral (assuming everything is as stated).
At this point, I would rather legalize (perhaps with some, still hefty penalties for under 18 drug supplying/use).
And, I would have all government “welfare” programs drug test everyone involved once a year or once a month. Use drugs, lose benefits. I probably would even include smoking and alcohol (but I would not make either illegal–just do it on your own dime).
Earned Insurance payments (i.e., retirement, Medicare, etc.) would not be included in use it/loose it.
I would also let companies test for drug usage and fire (for cause) if it interferes with job performance/safety (at will employment–personal choice usage). That would even include cigarette smoking around tank farms, etc. (i.e., dangerous behavior).
I would include government “assisted” programs to help kick habits (and self medication issues)–But those would have to be time limited (i.e., six months) and not another long term disability to welfare type program.
Crime reduction, healthier population, tax increases (on recreational use), and personal responsibility (bad personal choices have consequences).
BfC (a1cf00) — 4/7/2013 @ 10:50 amThis seems like overly zealous prosecutors, unless there are facts we don’t know about. Plus, the prosecutors act like they have quotas, too.
DRJ (a83b8b) — 4/7/2013 @ 10:59 amhttp://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-21939453
happyfeet (8ce051) — 4/7/2013 @ 11:02 amThat this is the norm should surprise no one.
We all knew and now know that cops have quotas for tickets and arrests. It’s a reasonable way to judge whether someone is doing the job they’re supposed to do compared with someone just going through the motions. It’s easy and so it gets used instead of better metrics and maybe a lazy super gets by by doing this regularly. It’s been going on for YEARS. And we all know it and knew it then.
That prosecutors do the same thing should be no surprise. They have the added burden of actually making cases and putting away criminals so it should be no surprise that even the honest ones find they must cut some corners and cross some lines to find/make cases that result in convictions. Roll over accomplices can really make a case in front of a jury and can also be used to can plea bargains and more informants/information. The piling on of charges that prosecutors are allowed (and probably required) to do thus bolstering the possibility of forcing someone to take a plea deal in fear of more time.
It’s criminal because it lessens the justice one gets from the law. (already barely noticeable to some) It lessens the credibility of prosecutors when they step over the line and make cases based on lies, withheld information and coercion of the defendant and witnesses.
What gets me is that he agreed to try to help but because the cases couldn’t get made (something he had no input into) he gets the entire bit. Something that shrieks of unfairness and a cynical lack of concern on the prosecutors part.
I realize that most mutts that come before a judge are usually guilty of SOMETHING and none of them are shining examples of human decency or courage but prosecutors (and cops) see too many and start to become numb to their plight and to where they are sending them.
It makes the LAW look bad and it makes the LAW ABIDING more contemptuous of the LAW. Neither opinions by the citizenry that is useful for Law Enforcement nor it’s reputation.
Not enough supervisors or at least good ones is the reason for the laxness in oversight. That and the attitude towards citizens before the law works it’s way up the chain and no one cares because they might lose their job if they care.
It’s a conundrum. Maybe cops and prosecutors should get paid time outs to work the other side of the street somehow (street counselors/public defenders). Refresh their humanity and nourish a better feeling towards their fellow man in general. Even if in particular he is someone worthy of disdain and contempt.
Jcw46 (0af03c) — 4/7/2013 @ 11:07 amWell Jacksonville, that’s Angela Corey’s bailiwick no, she’s known for other things now.
narciso (3fec35) — 4/7/2013 @ 11:08 amcan also be used to can plea bargains
Was meant to be:
can also be used to leverage plea bargains
sometimes my brain goes faster than my fingers can catch up to. (or is the other way round?)
Jcw46 (0af03c) — 4/7/2013 @ 11:13 amAbuse of prescription drugs has become an epidemic. SInce most pharmacies now require an on line prescription from an MD rather than a printed scipt pad, it’s harder to get opiates and other pain killers. The most underreported addiction stories involve prescription painkillers rather than street drugs. A case in Long Island last year involved a man and his grilfriend who killed a pharmacist and several customers in order to rob the store of it’s inventory.
Still this case on it’s face, like much of the local enforcement of drug laws, looks like overkill.Suspect that you had a narcotics team looking for a number and they have little discretion. They got an informant working off his own case and wanted him to produce, no matter how small the fish.
Bugg (b32862) — 4/7/2013 @ 11:28 amI believe that selling drugs is a serious crime, and I am glad they criminalize many drugs.
However, if this idiocy is the best way they can come up with to enforce such laws, I’m all for legalizing everything. This conduct is morally much worse than the crime.
Dustin (6e7388) — 4/7/2013 @ 11:42 amInteresting that a local yahoo trying to help someone gets 25 years for a one time event and doctors running illicit pain clinics selling hundreds of thousands, or even millions, of pills a year are walking away scott free. Both cases in Florida.
I don’t believe Osceola is in angela corey’s bailiwick.
Jim (ba6a58) — 4/7/2013 @ 11:51 amHow did they know that he had leftover painkillers and might be willing to sell them?
Icy (f26d3c) — 4/7/2013 @ 11:52 amDid they cross-reference controlled substance prescriptions with criminal records and target anyone that fell into both categories?
Well geez! It isn’t like they accused him of committing second degree murder when he engaged in self-defense or anything.
Icy (f26d3c) — 4/7/2013 @ 11:58 amIt’s not like they don’t have a bunch of “redneck heroin” (Oxy) to go after.
Colonel Haiku (2a3ea4) — 4/7/2013 @ 12:21 pmThe law is an ass.
Dave Surls (46b08c) — 4/7/2013 @ 1:03 pmYou can tell how peaceful American gun owners are.
htom (412a17) — 4/7/2013 @ 1:37 pmHow many drug transactions are over a thousand or over 1500 dollars?
This was nearly 2000 dollars – so if someone stole 2000 dollars here in tennessee I’m seeing 4 to 10 year sentences
And he wasnt a first offender he spent 2 years in prison at 18
25 years is harsh but 10 years is a decent sentence
EPWJ (6140f6) — 4/7/2013 @ 1:46 pmThe fact that this guy had the painkillers so many years later when this undercover showed up is pretty clear evidence that he was hardly in the practice of selling drugs illegally.
They would have been long gone since if so. But the question of how they targeted him for this entrapment is unanswered for me at the moment, unless I missed it.
SPQR (6b2dff) — 4/7/2013 @ 1:55 pmWhat gets me is how he was supposed to come up with these five convictions. It’s not as if he was a gang member, part of a criminal network, and so would know other criminals and could turn them in. How was he supposed to know any criminals?
Milhouse (28f910) — 4/7/2013 @ 2:05 pmRemind me of how many years Ted Kennedy got in the Mary Jo Kopechne death??
Dana the Pharmacist (694db4) — 4/7/2013 @ 2:17 pmJoke Bidens’ daugther on tape doing cocaine. How many years did she get?
Fast and Furious. Eric Holder? What was the sentence there??
Ashley Biden didn’t get into any trouble at all for her very public cocaine benders
happyfeet (c60db2) — 4/7/2013 @ 2:22 pmIt is shocking, but some cases should shock. I am no fan of either mandatory minimums or snitches, but I also detest dealers who sell at 10,000% markup to addicts who in turn rob, steal and prostitute to get the money. Maybe this guy is a small-fry doofus but that serves even better to send the message “Dealing drugs is no joke”.
And it makes no difference that the morphine and hydrocodone were “prescription”, in fact it makes it worse. It is corruption of a system whose purpose is to alleviate suffering, not be the manufacturing division of criminals.
nk (d4662f) — 4/7/2013 @ 2:26 pmMilhouse, well my impression was that he wasn’t supposed to “know” five criminals, he was supposed to create them…
SPQR (768505) — 4/7/2013 @ 2:27 pmnk, everything you say is true but I still don’t see where there was any crime occurring before the undercover showed up.
I know that is not the legal standard for entrapment, but it is my standard.
SPQR (768505) — 4/7/2013 @ 2:28 pmAnd yet Eric Holder walks free.
Kevin Stafford (1d1b9e) — 4/7/2013 @ 2:29 pmBut the question of how they targeted him for this entrapment is unanswered for me at the moment, unless I missed it.
It’s in the BBC link. The snitch who snitched him out had to come up with snitchees to get a better deal.
nk (d4662f) — 4/7/2013 @ 2:32 pmThere was a decently colorable case for entrapment — the $1,800.00 argues against it but no predisposition before the cajoling/enticement argues in its favor. It’s a fact issue, weight and credibility, and I imagine had he gone to trial it would have been argued along with a long history of law-abidedness.
nk (d4662f) — 4/7/2013 @ 2:37 pmAshley Biden didn’t get into any trouble at all for her very public cocaine benders
Comment by happyfeet
I think Slow Joe’s mouth has developed a bad habit… Bolivian Marching Powder… the cake-hole never shuts.
Colonel Haiku (2a3ea4) — 4/7/2013 @ 2:40 pmThis is the poster case of why it’s time to end the drug war. It’s time to legalize all drugs. No prescriptions needed. It only hurts innocent people and actually increases crime.
We tried prohibition in the 1920s and it didn’t work then. Why people continue to believe it will be different this time baffles me.
Patrick Henry (22fed1) — 4/7/2013 @ 3:12 pmI want to know if the defendant had sold drugs before, because I’m concerned by the defendant’s claim that he had recently loaned money to the informant/drug purchaser. If that’s true, then selling the informant painkillers seems more like the action of a friend than a drug dealer.
Of course, it was still a prohibited sale so the defendant should be punished. However, by prosecuting him as a drug dealer when he had not sold drugs before (and I’m assuming that’s the case), then it sounds more like a prosecutorial quota system than a justice system.
DRJ (a83b8b) — 4/7/2013 @ 3:22 pmMy wife and I share prescrition painkillers all the time. Which is also highly illegal. But- much easier then going to the doctor for a new prescription when the signifcant other has some leftover.
The fact that we have leftover’s from prescription painkillers speaks to the fact we’re not drug abusers. When you manage to amass a collection of sporadic pains- bad knees, pulled muscles, etc. you tend to learn which pain reliever you’re going to need.
Going to attempt funny here. Did read once of a recipe collection for leftover wine, and thought to myself, “What’s leftover wine?”
Harold (3c33bb) — 4/7/2013 @ 4:10 pmI think Horner’s whole story is bogus, frankly. From the “leftover own pills” (four bottles, really?) to “afford prescriptions or rent” (the pharmacy costs more than the street?). I doubt Horner paid near that much for them, and even if he did they were now useless to him, why not just give them to his “friend”?
And it does not sound like one mandatory minimum sentence but, likely, several consecutive sentences for separate sales. At least
nk (d4662f) — 4/7/2013 @ 4:35 pmI cannot find a 25-year mandatory minimum in the Florida Statute but I did find 5-year and 10-year minimums depending on the amounts delivered.
Maybe they threatened to count each bottle as a sale.
Steve57 (be3310) — 4/7/2013 @ 4:50 pmSorry, my mistake. There is a mandatory minimum of 25 years for 28 grams or more of morphine and/or hydrocodone. And that’s a lot. They probably added up the four bottles to get there.
nk (d4662f) — 4/7/2013 @ 4:54 pmSomebody who sells 28 grams or more is what we call an “ounce dealer” up here, BTW. Wholesaler.
nk (d4662f) — 4/7/2013 @ 4:58 pmNow, I don’t deny the propensity of Florida law enforcement, to screw it up, but this a Conor Friedersdorf report on a BBC investigation, that’s turtles all the way down.
narciso (3fec35) — 4/7/2013 @ 5:05 pmHmmm … I wonder …
How much past their use-by date were the pain-killers ? Did they still contain the active controlled substance in anywhere near the amounts on the bottle’s label ?
The BBC article makes it seem as though the pain-killers were around 10 years old … and a quick scan online seems to support the active ingredients still being effective …
Which still leaves the bad taste of quotas in what is described …
A dealer who is supposedly trafficing in a product and his stock is 10 years old ? This doesn’t exactly fill *me* with confidence that the Law Enforcement folk involved are effectively pursuing actual drug dealers … it sounds as though they could just as legitimately have prosecuted him for practising medicine without a licence …
Potentially worse yet, it does *not* speak well of the local public defender(s) …
Alasdair (a28b33) — 4/7/2013 @ 5:28 pmI read about this case and I become irritated in a way that’s similar to how the following story made me feel. Or the type of situation that should make most people — regardless of their politics — really, really ticked off.
The one thing such stories have in common is the idiocy (and corruption) of people in the public sector — including cops, judges, legislators, etc — who, because of special power or privileges given to them via the government, can cause a lot of mischief.
If the US becomes increasingly corrupt in the way that a Banana Republic like Mexico is — where law enforcement can be as crooked as that nation’s infamous drug cartels — horror stories streaming out of the public sector will become increasingly common.
Lucky us.
Mark (65cee7) — 4/7/2013 @ 5:31 pmEvidently the ATF is feeling left out of the douchebag LEO contest.
SPQR (768505) — 4/7/2013 @ 5:44 pmWell it’s ridiculous to give him 25 years, when murderers rarely get that.
narciso (3fec35) — 4/7/2013 @ 6:13 pmIt doesn’t seem likely to me that someone had 4 bottles of narcotics worth $1,800 “left over” from a legitimate prescription years previously.
And given the rate of teen pregnancy and giving out condoms in high school I thought statutory rape was something that vanished around 1960.
This sounds more like an example of journalistic mess up, if not malpractice if the reporter is grinding an axe against drug abuse policy.
It is so confusing, we’re asked to believe that people get sent away for years for nothing, and at the same time violent criminals go free because of jail overcrowding, etc.
Which is it? Or is it either one depending on whether “they” like you or not?
Did the guy really want the picture of his kids in the paper???
MD in Philly (3d3f72) — 4/7/2013 @ 6:39 pmI can find Horner’s mugshot from his arrest in Kissimmee, but no other story besides that presented by the BBC, refracted by Conor’s view,
narciso (3fec35) — 4/7/2013 @ 6:53 pmProbably both are true.
Milhouse (28f910) — 4/7/2013 @ 7:08 pmI can’t speak to how appropriate the sentence is, but I would have two questions…
First, why would he have 4 bottles? I could understand 1 or 1 and a partial bottle. Having 4 bottles means he got at least two refills that he KNEW he wouldn’t need.
Second, why did he sell them rather than give them to his “friend”? I mean, if he was so concerned about his friend’s pain, why try to make a profit?
Disclaimer: I am not condoning practicing medicine without a license which is essentially the apparent defense claim. You should not give medicine to others because you don’t know their history, allergies, other medicines which may interact (although most people have done just that at some point), so you may end up doing them a very dangerous favor.
Stashiu3 (1680c0) — 4/7/2013 @ 7:24 pmI see some of this has been addressed since I last refreshed this afternoon. Maybe it just bears repeating? 😉
Stashiu3 (1680c0) — 4/7/2013 @ 7:29 pmFour bottles is easy. Even ten years ago there was auto-refill by mail. Stop taking, having a bottle and a half, go on vacation at the wrong time and you get two more bottles in the mail. (Pills are large, bottles small.) Then they won’t take them back. You’ve paid for them (or the co-pay) and keep them. I’ve had things like that happen.
Why sell them, rather than give them, … I suppose it would depend on how much he’d paid. One of the stories says he thought it was a gift, the payment was repayment of a loan.
People are still being prosecuted for statutory rape.
Tar, feathers, light punishment.
htom (412a17) — 4/7/2013 @ 7:47 pmFrom SPQR’s link:
Here’s more about that storefront “sting” the
keystoneATF cops were running:http://www.jsonline.com/watchdog/watchdogreports/atfs-milwaukee-sting-operation-marred-by-mistakes-failures-mu8akpj-188952581.html
It sounds like the only way they could make arrests would be to take advantage the mentally disabled.
Steve57 (be3310) — 4/7/2013 @ 8:10 pmhtom, “pills are large, bottles are small”. It had to be more than 28 grams of the opiate to trigger the mandatory minimum of 25 years. That’s a lot of pills at outpatient strengths (or at least I would hope so). Vicodin/Norco would have been ~2,800 tablets, morphine about 1,000 to 2,000.
nk (d4662f) — 4/7/2013 @ 8:13 pmIt would not surprise me to find that the distinction between “weight of opiate” and “weight of drug including enclosing gel capsule” was ignored.
http://www.drugs.com/dosage/morphine.html#Usual_Adult_Dose_for_Pain —
Oral, Sublingual, or Buccal: 5 to 30 mg every 3 to 4 hours as needed
Extended release: range from 10 mg to 600 mg daily, given in equally divided doses every 8 to 12 hours or given as one dose every 24 hours
30mg every 3-4 hours, ~200 mg/day
6000 mg/month
18 grams in a 90 day maintaining fill, several bottles worth.
Quit taking, get another 90 days by mistake.
Easy to have 28 grams of active substance.
The law, it is mindless.
The prosecution … doesn’t have that excuse.
htom (412a17) — 4/7/2013 @ 8:51 pmSome laws regarding narcotics vary by state, but typically anything stronger than codeine cannot be refilled, but needs a new prescription. Technology may be changing some things, but in many states anyway a pharmacy needs a handwritten prescription by the doc, nothing called in or faxed in. (I guess secured on-line ordering may be done some places).
It would be surprising to me if narcotics were routinely refilled via mail pharmacy in Fla., they certainly are not in PA.
MD in Philly (3d3f72) — 4/7/2013 @ 9:01 pmIt’s a pyramid scheme!
(No, I’m not kidding.)
bridget (84c06f) — 4/7/2013 @ 9:06 pmNothing about either side of this story sits right with me.
JD (fe3864) — 4/7/2013 @ 9:09 pmSo the BBC link leads here,
http://www.snitching.org/
which is not the most objective take on the subject,
narciso (3fec35) — 4/7/2013 @ 9:26 pmI may have become too cynical about these things, but I don’t think so;
http://www.lls.edu/aboutus/facultyadministration/faculty/facultylistl-r/natapoffalexandra/
narciso (3fec35) — 4/7/2013 @ 9:32 pmI like turtles.
In all seriousness, I hope the prosecutors respond. I don’t know whether Conor or the BBC were terribly concerned with their point of view.
Patterico (93fb17) — 4/7/2013 @ 10:45 pmBad laws lead to bad results.
Kevin M (bf8ad7) — 4/8/2013 @ 12:05 amThis happens a lot In Mobile Al. Once they bust you, they fully expect you to set up others to purchase under their watch at all hours of the night. When they call you , you will go and sell or you will be prosecuted to the fullest extent.Mainly, youthful offenders.Making dealers out of good kids. When the feds want you, they will get you.
Joe (0c596c) — 4/8/2013 @ 12:20 amStashiu3,
Regarding the 4 prescriptions, I don’t see anything indicating they were the same medications … only that they were all painkillers.
Regarding why he sold them instead of gave them to the informant, good question. Maybe it’s because the defendant is a drug dealer. Or maybe it’s because the informant insisted so he could satisfy the prosecutors.
DRJ (a83b8b) — 4/8/2013 @ 1:21 amAbout prescribing medications for pain control-
Typically a responsible doc writes for a limited number of narcotics for an acute injury, and not for more than a month even for chronic pain in a trusted patient.
There may be good reason to prescribe 2 types of narcotics, especially in chronic pain, one which is long acting to be taken on a regular schedule, and another that is short acting to use as “rescue” if the long acting proves not to be adequate on occasion.
Other types of medications can be prescribed to control pain which are not narcotics, but typically when “pain pills” are discussed concerning abuse I assume narcotics is what they mean, but unless we get more details, who knows.
One could postulate a month long prescription for a long acting morphine and a short acting morphine were prescribed, but the patient had a side effect with the morphine and needed new scripts for OxyContin and percocet, for example, but in that event I would ask the patient to bring the morphine in to be destroyed.
But all of this is largely speculative when applied to the scanty details we have.
MD in Philly (3d3f72) — 4/8/2013 @ 5:01 amJCW46, I understand that you think we shouldn’t be surprised to find that prosecutors have quotas and engage in this kind of behavior, but surely you’re aware that the author of this post – who expressed surprise – is *himself* a prosecutor.
aphrael (8f64e4) — 4/8/2013 @ 6:22 amR.I.P. Margaret Thatcher
Icy (f26d3c) — 4/8/2013 @ 6:30 amhttp://legalinsurrection.com/2013/04/margaret-thatcher-dies-rip-iron-lady/
narciso (3fec35) — 4/8/2013 @ 6:32 amReally? It’s communicable?
Or is it just more common than you’d like?
Rob Crawford (6c262f) — 4/8/2013 @ 7:14 amI’m pretty sure the BATFEIEIO is the champion of the douchebag LEO competition. They are the home of the “prove your innocence” school of “law” in the US.
(From what I understand, they get upset that they’re not a “three letter agency” like DHS, FBI, CIA, etc.)
Rob Crawford (6c262f) — 4/8/2013 @ 7:20 amTo me, that creates an incentive for someone to cut corners or go over the top.
Of course.
By the way, Horner made the deal, but couldn’t come through:
Because he wasn’t really a drug delaer, and wasn’t part of any network.
It’s all now, with some prosecutors, a formula. They let someone get off if he found other people.
BTW, the person he found actually was entrapped. It sounds like he had an excellent entrapment defense. Technically they sometimes don’t work, even if true, but in this cvase there seems to be no indication he sold any to other people, or was brought up the idea himself. So it sounds like he could have a good appeal based on incompetent counsel.
The prosecutors are just building cases. they don;t even care what they get.
And it is even possible the prosecutors are themselves corrupt and took money or favors of some kind from the original defendant to let him off. How can they let him off? The way to let him off is to have him become an informant. This is probably much more common than you think, and in my opinion, it explains what Fast and Furious was all about (protecting some criminal – how do they protect him? – make him into an informanat and then go fishing)
I’ll go further. Maybe the payoff isn’t from the defendant but from some expensive lawyer the original defendant hires. They help the lawyer, and eventually they can get hired by the law firm. No MONEY CHANGES HANDS FOR SEVERAL YEARS. People who play ball get lucrative offers to join a firm, people who do not do not get them. I think such a system might be self-sustaining.
Horner failed to make cases against drug traffickers.
As a result, he was sentenced to the full 25 years in October last year and is now serving his sentence in Liberty Correctional Institution, outside Tallahassee. He will be 72 by the time he is released.
He has three young kids.
I often find that stories about crimes leave out details that make the defendant seem less sympathetic, and that may be the case here. I have contacted the Osceola County Attorney to ask them about the case, and if they tell me anything of interest, I will let you know. It’s hard to imagine what they could say that would make me feel right about this guy getting sent away for 25 years, but you never know unless you ask.
Comments (67)
Sammy Finkelman (d22d64) — 4/8/2013 @ 8:55 amSorry didn’t edit the quote.
Horner failed to make cases against drug traffickers.
Naturally, since he wa sthe wrong person to ask for this.
So only the truly truly harmless get long senetences. Anybody actually in the drug business can make a case against someone.
As a result, he was sentenced to the full 25 years in October last year and is now serving his sentence in Liberty Correctional Institution, outside Tallahassee. He will be 72 by the time he is released.
This whole case probably was entrapment, and he didn’t realize it. He had a bad, bad, lawyer. It wass thw rong thing to do for him. I wonder if the prosecutors recommended that lawyer.
He has three young kids.
I often find that stories about crimes leave out details that make the defendant seem less sympathetic, and that may be the case here. I have contacted the Osceola County Attorney to ask them about the case, and if they tell me anything of interest, I will let you know. It’s hard to imagine what they could say that would make me feel right about this guy getting sent away for 25 years, but you never know unless you ask.
Comments (67)
Sammy Finkelman (d22d64) — 4/8/2013 @ 8:58 amMD — you remind me of those in the medical profession that I see as a patient: intelligent, responsible, caring, a good citizen. Sadly, not all doctors and clinics are such, and, as demonstrated, it appears that not all prosecutors are such either.
htom (412a17) — 4/8/2013 @ 8:59 amStill didn’t edit it.
I have contacted the Osceola County Attorney to ask them about the case, and if they tell me anything of interest, I will let you know.
Ask him who suggested the lawyer John Horner used.
Sammy Finkelman (d22d64) — 4/8/2013 @ 8:59 am4.Comment by SPQR (768505) — 4/7/2013 @ 10:25 am
Without any sense that he regularly sold drugs, this is astoundingly disproportionate.
It’s not just disproportionate – he’s outright not guilty!
http://www.criminaldefenseattorneytampa.com/FloridaDefenses/Entrapment.aspx
Now, I imagine, if he was referrred to the lawyer he used by the investigators, the lawyer would not have wanted to use such a defense, becauise it would have ruined his relationship with the prosecutors.
I think there’s a good case here for prosecutorial misconduct if they had anything at all to do with him getting the lawyer he did.
Sammy Finkelman (d22d64) — 4/8/2013 @ 9:06 amThis type of thing could be why DA’s need protection. This far exceeds justice and flows over into police and prosecutorial excess. With bad people being let out of jails due to overcrowding I do not understand why those who are supposed to uphold justice and protect the public do things like this.
GoneWithTheWind (f8c7ee) — 4/8/2013 @ 9:12 amNow if the case isn’t as told to the newspapers, things are a little different, but the story told to the newspapers is a story of entrapment.
According to the newspaper story, Horner says he didn’t actually get the full $1,800, and some (or all?) of what he did get was repayment of money he had lent him (or spent on his behalf?) before (or after this started?)
But $1,800 or even $500 doesn’t seem to fit with ‘Look dude, I can either pay my rent or go buy my prescriptions. I can’t do both.’
I think Horner’s story is that the informant asked BOTH for pills and for money, and he gave him both, and the money he got was repayment for the money he had loaned him off camera and off video..
It seems like he had a public defender. Who of course has so many cases of mostly guilty people he never botehrs to look at the details
Sammy Finkelman (d22d64) — 4/8/2013 @ 9:17 amWow, four bottles of “leftover” pain killers. How did the informant know he had the meds? Has he sold any before? And they asked him to help put other dealers behind bars? Did he admit that he knew other dealers? Isn’t it just a little bit coincidental that he had 4 bottles of “leftover” pain killers and knew a bunch of other drug dealers who specialized in selling prescription painkillers? Isn’t anyone thinking these things through?
Federale (805720) — 4/8/2013 @ 1:05 pmAnd where do you get that from, Mr. Fed?
Steve57 (be3310) — 4/8/2013 @ 1:16 pmHow did they know? State collects names and addresses of people receiving them from pharmacies?
htom (412a17) — 4/8/2013 @ 2:56 pmJohn Horner ended up with a public defender, but did he start off with a public defender?
Anyway we know there are important pieces missing from this story.
Sammy Finkelman (d22d64) — 4/9/2013 @ 9:38 am