Robert Gill drug dealer whose life sentenced was commuted by President Barack Obama is back in jail after a drugs bust. Did the president get it all wrong?
Robert Gill a former drug dealer whose life sentence was commuted by outgoing President Barack Obama is back in jail after crashing his vehicle while fleeing a drug deal.
The man’s re-incarceration comes after Robert Martinez Gill, 68, (also known as Robert M. Gill) had his life sentence commuted in 2015 together along with 1,700 other federal inmates as a broader strategy to give relief to nonviolent offenders serving prison for drug offenses, the San Antonio Express-News reports.
He’d served prison time for cocaine and heroin distribution conspiracy since 1990.
Whilst inside, the former drug dealer earned a legal education and had petitioned the president for a second chance after his court appeals were unsuccessful.
Gill’s prison warden also stood up for him, saying: ‘Robert has reformed and rehabilitated himself and poses no threat to the outside world.’
In a signed notification approving the commutation application in 2015, then-President Obama wrote that Gill deserves it ‘because you have demonstrated the potential to turn your life around. … Now it is up to you to make the most of this opportunity.’
That all went down the drain come Thursday, when the reformed drug dealer (do you suppose?) was arrested in San Antonio after crashing his vehicle into another motorist while fleeing from a drug deal.
According to a criminal complaint affidavit, Gill contacted an unidentified person to arrange a drug deal involving a kilo of the good shit cocaine. After he received a black backpack and started driving, a sheriff’s deputy tried to pull him over.
Gill fled the police, only to collide with another motorist. He again tried to drive away, but his car was disabled by law enforcement officers. Agents found the backpack in the car, containing a kilo of cocaine, an arrest affidavit noted.
Of note, the drug deal had gone down after the Texas man had earlier that afternoon met with his probation officer.
Noted the San Antonio Express-News: ‘After his release in 2015, he began working as a paralegal for local criminal defense law firm LaHood & Calfas, and he appeared to make the most of it. A Vietnam veteran who succumbed to the world of drugs, he said he sought to reform himself.’
Appearing in court on Friday, a judge ordered Gill held without bond pending a bail later in February. The man is charged with possession with intent distribute 500 grams or more of cocaine.
He faces a sentence with a mandatory minimum, five years, and could get up to 40 years in prison notes heatst.
Recidivism rates for those charged with drug crimes stand at 77 percent, according to a Justice Department study commissioned under former attorney general Eric Holder.
Offered Ronald Schmidt, Gill’s lawyer who’d helped the ‘reformed drug dealer’ to appeal his sentence in the courts : ‘I’m so disappointed to hear that he got arrested again.’
Robert Martinez Gill faces a return to prison for up to 40 years, if convicted.
