(BCN) — An ex-San Jose police union supervisor is avoiding jail time after illegally importing opioids for overseas drug suppliers — ending a scandal that began almost two years in the past. U.S. District Choose Eumi Okay. Lee sentenced Joanne Segovia to a few years’ probation and 100 hours of group service, after she confessed in October to operating a yearslong unlawful drug smuggling operation out of her house for a provider in India.
Federal prosecutors agreed with Segovia’s lawyer that the previous workplace supervisor of the San Jose Police Officers’ Affiliation (SJPOA) — who deliberate social occasions and coordinated fallen officer memorials — wasn’t motivated by greed, however dependancy.
“The story of Joanne Segovia is the story of years of heavy opioid addiction, drug importation, self-delusion, and some very poor choices. It is not, however, the story of a drug dealer,” Assistant U.S. Lawyer Joseph Tartakovsky wrote in a sentencing memo. “Drug dealers get into the business to make money. Segovia was losing money. In fact, she was hemorrhaging tens of thousands a year on her habit.”
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Federal prosecutors initially accused Segovia of importing fentanyl. However at an August listening to — in a case drawn out by repeat delays — Tartakovsky mentioned subsequent checks on a package deal they intercepted and initially recognized as fentanyl was incorrect. Prosecutors revised prices in opposition to Segovia to making an attempt to smuggle Tapentadol, one other extremely addictive painkiller. An individual convicted of smuggling the drug could be sentenced to a most of 20 years in jail.
The almost two-year authorized saga raised questions in regards to the police union’s oversight. Federal prosecutors issued a scathing rebuke of the union, accusing its legal professionals of attempting to hamstring the investigation regardless of publicly promising to cooperate.
“The SJPOA announced publicly after the search of Segovia’s office that it wished to cooperate with this investigation. Yet counsel for the SJPOA engaged in stonewalling, even threatening to ‘seek judicial intervention’ to stop the prosecution from reviewing Segovia’s SJPOA email contents, though the SJPOA never followed through on its threat,” Tartakovsky wrote.
A police union consultant was not instantly accessible for remark.
In 2022, Homeland Safety brokers investigating a prison community in India turned conscious of Segovia’s involvement by way of a consumer listing on the cellphone of an arrested native operative. Brokers later realized Segovia’s house handle had been the vacation spot of 5 shipments containing tens of 1000’s of Zolpidem, Tramadol and Tapentadol tablets seized at ports of entry between 2019 and 2023. Information present one other 61 parcels arrived at her house between 2015 and 2023 from numerous nations, labeled with harmless phrases reminiscent of “Gift Makeup,” “Chocolate and Sweets,” “Food Supplement” and “Health Product.”
In early 2023, federal brokers interviewed Segovia at her house. Segovia lied in regards to the shipments and later tried responsible them on her housekeeper.
Segovia expressed regret in a December letter to the decide.
“I have not taken one unprescribed pill or substance since the day my home was raided by Homeland Security. I never realized the magnitude of what I had done until a gun was pointed at me. I have never been in trouble with the law,” Segovia wrote. “This was something I had only seen in movies. It was the most traumatic thing that has ever happened to me.”
She acknowledged her involvement possible harmed others.
“Upon reflection, I may have helped enable the addictions and drug abuse of people I don’t even know,” she wrote. “This was not my intent, but I am very sorry, nonetheless.”
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