BAY CITY - A 21-year-old Saginaw man, Cortiyah Moore, was convicted yesterday of several drug and gun offenses by a federal jury in Bay City following a 3-day trial before the Hon. Thomas L. Ludington, United States Attorney Dawn N. Ison announced today.
Ison was joined in the announcement by Paul Vanderplow, Special Agent in Charge of the Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms & Explosive Detroit Field Division.
According to testimony and evidence introduced at the trial, on Sept. 27, 2021, troopers with the Michigan State Police conducted a traffic stop on a vehicle occupied by three men. The troopers found a loaded, semi-automatic pistol equipped with an extended magazine at Moore’s feet who was seated in the back seat. Moore had a large sum of cash on his person, as did the driver and front seat passenger. Elsewhere in the vehicle, the troopers found distribution quantities of fentanyl and crack, and a second pistol equipped with a drum magazine and an auto-sear which made the firearm a fully automatic machinegun. The jury returned guilty verdicts on all counts; conspiracy to distribute fentanyl and crack cocaine, possession with intent to distribute fentanyl and crack cocaine, possessing a firearm in furtherance of a drug trafficking crime, and felon in possession of a firearm.
Moore, a convicted felon who was on probation at the time, faces a mandatory minimum sentence of five years in prison and a maximum of life. Moore will be sentenced by the Hon. Thomas L. Ludington on Jan. 19, 2023.
The case was investigated by troopers with the Michigan State Police and special agents with the ATF. The case was prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorney J. Michael Buckley.
Source: U.S. Department of Justice, Office of the United States Attorneys
