A Camden man was sentenced today to 63 months in prison for conspiring to distribute heroin and cocaine in the Camden area, Acting U.S. Attorney Rachael A. Honig announced.
Federal officials said Mr. Jameel Byng, 28, previously pleaded guilty before U.S. District Judge Renée Marie Bumb in Camden federal court to an information charging him with conspiracy to distribute 100 grams or more of heroin.
According to authorities, during his sentencing hearing, Byng agreed that the amount of heroin jointly attributable to him, as a member of the conspiracy, was 400-700 grams.
He also acknowledged his role, as a member of the conspiracy, with respect to the distribution of cocaine.
According to documents filed in this case and statements made in court:
A total of 19 defendants were arrested in late 2018 on drug-trafficking charges based on the FBI’s investigation of a drug-trafficking organization that ran the open-air narcotics trade on the 400-500 block of Pine Street in Camden for several months in 2018.
The investigation used video surveillance, confidential informants, consensual recordings, controlled drug purchases, and several court-authorized wiretaps to uncover the inner workings of the drug-trafficking organization.
The organization included street-level sellers like Byng who worked various shifts on the “drug set,” selling drugs to customers and collecting drug proceeds.
These street-level sellers were supervised by different layers of managers who, in turn, supplied the drug set with pre-packaged heroin, some of which was mixed with fentanyl, as well as cocaine and crack cocaine.
The FBI and other law enforcement officers recovered multiple firearms from different locations connected to the drug organization at the time of the 2018 arrests.
Seventeen of these defendants already have entered guilty pleas on drug conspiracy charges before Judge Bumb in the United States District Court.
Taken together, the guilty pleas in this case reflect that the various members of the drug-trafficking organization sold massive amounts of heroin, some of which was mixed with fentanyl, as well as crack cocaine and cocaine in Camden.
Two defendants are awaiting trial.
The case is currently set for trial before Judge Bumb on May 9, 2022.
The charges and allegations against those two defendants are merely accusations, and they are presumed innocent unless and until proven guilty.