Defendant Also Ran Decrepit Longview Hotel Rife With Drug Dealing
The former owner of a Longview nightclub and long-stay hotel, was sentenced today in U.S. District Court in Tacoma to five years in prison and five years of supervised release, announced U.S. Attorney Jenny A. Durkan. CHRISTOPHER LONNIE REID, 52, pleaded guilty in October 2012 to distribution of methamphetamine. REID was charged federally in 2011 following an undercover investigation by the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) and the Cowlitz-Wahkiakum Narcotics Task Force. At sentencing U.S. District Judge Ronald B. Leighton said, “this crime (methamphetamine distribution) destroys the fabric of a community brick by brick."
According to records filed in the case on Oct. 22, 2010 and again on Oct. 27, 2010 REID distributed methamphetamine to a person working with law enforcement.
In their sentencing memo, prosecutors noted that REID was distributing drugs at the same time he was making money by renting rooms to drug addicts. “Reid has owned a residential hotel-type building in Longview for the past several years. Reid’s business, the Smallwood Hotel, rented small rooms. The hotel had the reputation in the community of housing drug addicts,… Given Reid’s drug dealing, the fact that he ran a hotel for drug addicts is an aggravating factor that this Court should consider when sentencing Reid," prosecutors wrote in their sentencing memo.
The case was investigated by the DEA and the Cowlitz-Wahkiakum Narcotics Task Force. The case was prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorney Brian Werner.
Source: U.S. Department of Justice, Office of the United States Attorneys
