Timothy M. O’Shea, the United States Attorney for the Western District of Wisconsin, announced that Cedric Sanders from Janesville, Wisconsin, has been sentenced to 7 ½ years in federal prison. U.S. District Judge William M. Conley delivered the sentence after Sanders pleaded guilty on December 5, 2024, to charges of possessing fentanyl intended for distribution and illegally possessing firearms.
In November 2023, Sanders was involved in selling fentanyl to a confidential informant twice and an undercover officer twice. Searches conducted by officers in December 2023 at three homes and two vehicles linked to Sanders uncovered two firearms, firearm magazines, ammunition, a firearm suppressor, a high-capacity firearm drum magazine, $12,960 in cash, and approximately 396 grams (4,545 pills) of fentanyl. Due to prior felony convictions, Sanders is prohibited from legally owning firearms.
Judge Conley emphasized that "the dangers of distributing fentanyl combined with Sanders’s illegal possession of two firearms warranted a significant prison sentence."
The investigation leading to these charges was carried out by the Janesville Police Department and the Drug Enforcement Administration with assistance from the ATF Madison Crime Gun Task Force. This task force includes federal agents from ATF along with Task Force Officers (TFOs) from various state and local agencies throughout the Western District of Wisconsin. Assistant U.S. Attorneys Jennifer Remington and William Levins prosecuted this case.
This case falls under Operation Take Back America—an initiative aimed at utilizing resources from the Department of Justice to combat illegal immigration invasions while eliminating cartels and transnational criminal organizations as well as protecting communities from violent crime perpetrators.
