April 18, 2024
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Trafficking brings prison term Winter Harbor man jumped bail after drug, firearm charges

BANGOR – A former Winter Harbor man was sentenced Monday to 71/2 years in federal prison for drug trafficking and possession of a firearm.

Michael Silvia, 23, was charged with one count of possession with intent to distribute cocaine, one count of possession with intent to distribute marijuana, and one count of possession of a firearm in furtherance of drug trafficking. He pleaded guilty to the drug charges earlier this year and was convicted on the gun charge in a jury-waived trial in early October.

Silvia has no criminal record, but the fact that he jumped bail in August and fled to Missouri added time to his sentence. However, Silvia turned himself in to authorities eight days after leaving Maine, his Bangor attorney, Terrence Harrigan, told the court.

A Maine State Police officer clocked Silvia’s car at 89 mph on Interstate 95 on Feb. 25, according to court documents. Trooper Scott Hamilton found in Silvia’s pocket a small plastic bag containing marijuana.

The officer also discovered approximately 230 grams of cocaine, 160 grams of marijuana and a loaded .22-caliber handgun in a bag on the rear floor of the car. Silvia admitted that the bag belonged to him.

Judge George Singal sentenced him to 21/2 years in prison on each of the drug charges with the sentences to run concurrently, and a mandatory five years on the firearms possession charge to run consecutively with the drug sentences.

In other matters, the court sentenced Charles Thomas Rosart Jr. of Toronto to eight months in jail for entering the United States after exclusion. The 48-year-old Canadian has been in the Penobscot County Jail since his arrest May 19. He is expected to be released and to return to Canada next month.

It was the third time Rosart had entered the country after exclusion. He was convicted in Canada in the 1980s of illicit sexual contact with minor males, according to the U.S. District Attorney’s Office.

Rosart’s attorney, N. Laurence Willey Jr. of Brewer, told the judge that his client had been to a hockey tournament in the Maritimes and was a passenger when the driver entered the United States with the intention of “passing through” on the return route to Toronto. Rosart’s guilty plea and sentence, in effect, bans him from the United States, according to Singal.

A 52-year-old Houlton man was sentenced to three months in jail for possessing three firearms after he had been convicted of assault, criminal threatening and drunken driving between 1995 and 2000. Stephen A. Thompson also was ordered to pay a $500 fine and serve three years probation.


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