Keene man sentenced to time served on federal drug conspiracy charge
Aug. 24—A Keene man has been sentenced to time served on a federal charge that he conspired with another Elm City resident to distribute crack cocaine and fentanyl in 2019.
Judge Landya McCafferty sentenced Jason Martin, 37, in U.S. District Court of New Hampshire in Concord on Thursday after he pleaded guilty to a felony charge of conspiracy to distribute a controlled substance, according to court filings. As part of the plea agreement, prosecutors dropped a charge of distribution of a controlled substance.
A grand jury indicted Martin and Heidi Compos, 54, also of Keene, in January 2020 on federal drug charges after their initial arrest by local police about two months earlier. Cheshire County prosecutors dropped the pending state charges against the two after the federal indictment was issued.
When they arrested Martin and Compos in November 2019, Keene police said that a search of the Pearl Street house where the two lived turned up $19,000 in cash, about 200 grams of suspected heroin or fentanyl and about 10 grams of suspected crack cocaine.
Affidavits filed in Cheshire County Superior Court after their arrests describe a series of drug purchases arranged by police. Between October and November 2020, one confidential informant working with police bought drugs from Martin once and from Compos on two other occasions, the affidavit states.
Compos has pleaded guilty in federal court to aiding and abetting distribution of a controlled substance and two counts of distributing a controlled substance according to court documents. As part of her plea deal, prosecutors have agreed to drop a charge of conspiracy to distribute a controlled substance. She is scheduled to be sentenced on Oct. 11.
Martin was released on bail after his arrest on the federal indictment on Jan. 20, 2020, with the condition that he report back to the substance-use treatment program he had been attending.
About 13 months later, following a string of positive drug tests, the court revoked Martin's bail and he was detained at the Cheshire County jail, where he would remain incarcerated for six months, court documents state.
Since being released on bail again in October 2021 to attend another addiction treatment center, Martin has remained sober, found steady employment and taken an active role in his adult daughter's life, according to a sentencing memorandum filed by his lawyer, Matthew Stachowske. The time-served sentence Judge McCafferty imposed includes three years of supervised release, court documents state.
Martin has also pleaded guilty in Cheshire County Superior Court to felony drug charges Keene police arrested him on in October 2019, according to documents filed in that case. He is scheduled to be sentenced on those charges on Tuesday.
Ryan Spencer can be reached at 352-1234, extension 1412, or rspencer@keenesentinel.com. Follow him on Twitter at @rspencerKS
