For cocaine trafficking, a Louisiana owner-operator was recently sentenced to nearly six years in prison.
In July, Rusty Ross Honore, 42, of New Iberia, Louisiana, pleaded guilty to a charge of conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute cocaine and marijuana in the United States District Court for the Western District of Louisiana.
After completing his prison sentence, Honore was sentenced to three years of supervised release and a $10,000 fine by U.S. District Judge Michael J. Juneau.
According to the Department of Justice, the Drug Enforcement Administration, and the United States Department of Homeland Security Investigations launched an investigation in March 2020 after receiving information that Honore was distributing cocaine in the Lafayette, Louisiana, area.
According to court records, Honore and two co-conspirators had and distributed about 207 pounds of marijuana and 2 kilograms of cocaine between March and June 2020.
Honore already served six years in jail after pleading guilty to conspiracy to possess cocaine and marijuana with the purpose to distribute them in 2006. He was freed from prison in 2012 and was placed on supervised release for another two years.
Honore filed for and received a $13,540 loan from the US Small Business Administration’s Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) for his one-truck enterprise in February, two months after his arrest on drug trafficking charges in December 2020 federal filings.
Honore has been given until 1 p.m. on December 27 to self-surrender the US Marshals Service.
Honore’s lawyer, J. Kevin Stockstill, did not respond to a request for comment from FreightWaves.
