GREENEVILLE, Tenn.- Three individuals involved in a conspiracy to manufacture methamphetamine were sentenced on Nov. 6, 2013, by the Honorable J. Ronnie Greer, U.S. District Judge. Timothy Dunbar, 42 of Erwin, Tenn., was sentenced to 84 months prison. Darren Hensley, 27 of Erwin, Tenn., was sentenced to 75 months in prison. Nathaniel Effler, 23, of Erwin, Tenn., was sentenced to 60 months in prison.
Each of these individuals pleaded guilty to a March 2013 federal indictment charging a total of 25 individuals with conspiracy to manufacture methamphetamine. Three additional separate but related conspiracies to manufacture methamphetamine cases from in and around the Erwin area were also recently prosecuted in U.S. District Court, resulting in the conviction of a total of 52 individuals. Sentencing is currently pending for nine of the individuals involved in these conspiracies.
The methamphetamine manufacturing conspiracy that these individuals admitted to being a part of involved a network of overlapping associates that relied on coordinated efforts to procure methamphetamine precursors which they then used to make methamphetamine using a "shake and bake" manufacturing method. The drugs the conspirators were responsible for making were being distributed both for profit and for use by people within the conspiracy.
The indictment and subsequent conviction of these individuals was the result of an ongoing and collaborative investigation conducted by the Unicoi County Sheriff’s Department, Washington County Sheriff’s Department, Erwin Police Department, First Judicial District Drug Task Force, Tennessee Bureau of Investigation, and Drug Enforcement Administration. Assistant U.S. Attorney J. Christian Lampe represented the United States.
Source: U.S. Department of Justice, Office of the United States Attorneys
