This is interesting.
Man in steroid scandal guilty in Xanax case.
Posted: 6:13 p.m. Friday, Oct. 31, 2014
By Jane Musgrave
Palm Beach Post Staff Writer
WEST PALM BEACH —
A Boca Raton man, best known as an opportunist who played both sides in the steroid investigation of disgraced baseball great Alex Rodriguez, pleaded guilty Friday to charges unrelated to Major League Baseball’s doping scandal.
In a confident voice that rang out in the near-empty federal courtroom, Gary Lee Jones admitted he sold thousands of counterfeit Xanax pills worth as much as $30,000 to undercover officers who were investigating him and two other South Florida men earlier this year.
Jones, who served time in Connecticut for passing counterfeit money in the 1990s, also admitted that, as a felon, he shouldn’t have possessed an AK-47. According to court documents, he sold the high-powered, semi-automatic weapon to an undercover officer for $1,000.
While the two charges carry a maximum 30-year term, Jones faces less than five years in prison when he is sentenced in January.
The tall, burly 55-year-old, who remains free on a $250,000 bond, declined comment on his connection to the investigation that led to Rodriguez’s year-long suspension from baseball.
“Happy Halloween,” he called out as he left the courthouse. Then, patting his sizable stomach, he added: “Don’t eat too much candy or you’ll end up like me.”
Jones grabbed headlines two years ago when it was reported that information he provided baseball investigators led to the downfall of Rodriguez and other baseball players for using performance-enhancing drugs.
A league investigator he met at a diner in Pompano Beach paid him $125,000 in cash for documents that showed Rodriguez had been a regular customer of Biogenesis’ anti-aging clinic in Coral Gables. Jones had a buddy record the exchange with his iPhone. Jones later sold the video to the former Yankees’ third-baseman for $200,000, according to published reports.
Despite his reported payoffs, Jones is represented by a public defender. Court records don’t indicate why he qualified for a tax-paid lawyer. As part of his plea deal, Jones agreed to forfeit $7,500 and a 1991 Mercedes-Benz.
The wide-ranging investigation that led to the arrests of Jones, Frank Fiore and Anthony Carbone, another bit player in the Biogenesis scandal, ran into trouble before agents charged the three with multiple felonies for allegedly selling phony Xanax, Ecstasy, and Viagra along with cocaine and weapons. One of the undercover agents, Palm Beach County Sheriff’s investigator Joaquin Fonseca Jr., was charged with official misconduct and possession of cocaine in an unrelated case. A snitch also was arrested.
Still, as they did with Jones, prosecutors negotiated plea deals with Carbone and Fiore, court records show. The owner of Havana Nights Cigar Bar and Lounge in Boca Raton, Fiore met with well-known mobsters and asked undercover officers to kill one person and break the legs of his brother-in-law, agents said.
Fiore, 60, of Parkland, is expected to appear in court soon to officially change his plea, records show. Carbone, 55, already has pleaded guilty to two of the 17 drug distribution charges he once faced. He is to be sentenced in December.
http://www.palmbeachpost.com/news/news/baseball-steroid-scandal-figure-pleads-guilty-to-s/nhxTd/
