A recidivist drug-dealing felon whose heroin network operated from Brookline and distributed across the region went to federal prison yesterday for nearly a decade, bringing a close to an investigation that began in 2018.
Martise Smith, 30, now of Stayton Street in Marshall-Shadeland but previously living in Brookline, had been the lead defendant in a seven-man heroin ring taken down by an FBI-led group of law officers in 2019 operating under the federal Organized Crime and Drug Enforcement Task Force program that pools resources.
U.S. District Judge William Stickman IV gave Smith 114 months, or 9½ years, as part of an agreed-upon sentence negotiated in a plea deal.
The case against Smith and his six criminal cohorts, all of whom have been convicted, was built on cellphone intercepts, surveillance and controlled buys.
Smith was captured in numerous wiretaps discussing heroin deals with his cronies.
He and his lawyer tried to get the wiretaps suppressed but failed. After that, he had little choice but to plead guilty.
The investigation began in the summer of 2018 when task force officers set up a pole camera near the gang’s stash house for drugs and guns at 1731 Concordia St. in Carrick, where Smith lived at the time.
After surveillance and controlled buys, the FBI initiated wiretaps in July and August 2019. In December of that year, law officers swept in to make arrests.
At one house on Wynoka Street in Carrick, the residence of drug dealer Lamont Goodwine, agents recovered an AR-15 with a laser sight, an AK-47 with a drum magazine and two handguns. They also found a marijuana grow operation in the basement along with a duffle bag full of heroin packaging materials.
Law officers found guns and cash at various other locations.
All of the ring members have now been sentenced.
Goodwine got 70 months; Raymond Jones of Wilkinsburg, time served; Robert Howard of Bethel Park, 30 months; David Joyner of McKeesport, 46 months; Duane Henderson of the North Side, two years; and Mbuitidem Essiet of Pittsburgh, 18 months.
Torsten covers the courts for the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, but he's currently on strike. Reach him at jtorsteno@gmail.com.
