Lexington man was already in prison, now he’ll spend decades more behind bars. Here’s why
A Lexington man who has spent more than a decade as an inmate in the South Carolina Department of Corrections will serve more time behind bars for running a drug dealing operation while locked up, the U.S. Attorney’s Office said.
Benjamin Johnathan Newman, 38, was sentenced to more than 26 years in federal prison after pleading guilty to conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute methamphetamine and heroin, the U.S. Attorney’s Office said Tuesday in a news release.
Newman has been an S.C. Department of Corrections inmate since 2012, serving a 25-year sentence for drug trafficking, according to the release. There was no word if Newman will begin serving his federal prison sentence immediately, or if the term will begin at the end of his sentence for his prior drug trafficking conviction in South Carolina.
Since he’s been in prison, S.C. Department of Corrections officials have seized 16 illegal contraband cellphones from Newman, the U.S. Attorney’s Office said.
Since at least January 2018, Newman used those phones to lead a large-scale drug distribution operation and ordered large quantities of meth, heroin, cocaine and marijuana to be imported, including direct communication with sources in Mexico, according to the release.
“Some of our highest volume drug traffickers are working from a prison cell,” U.S. Attorney for the District of South Carolina Adair Ford Boroughs said in the release.
Newman recruited drivers to pick up the drugs in Georgia, Texas, and Florida and to deliver the drugs to stash houses in the Lexington County area, where the operation would then supply drug dealers in South Carolina, the U.S. Attorney’s Office said.
The operation also used threats of violence to protect against cooperation with law enforcement and to protect its drug supply, according to the release.
More than 350 kilograms of meth, four kilograms of heroin, about a kilogram of cocaine, 18 kilograms of marijuana, and 250 grams of crack cocaine were distributed in South Carolina by Newman and the operation, the U.S. Attorney’s Office said.
“This man is a very large-scale drug dealer in South Carolina, and he was able to continue his crimes from behind bars using illegal cellphones,” S.C. Department of Corrections Director Bryan Stirling said in the release. “His conviction highlights the urgent need for state prisons to be able to jam illegal contraband cell phones.”
Newman is not the only person involved in the operation who will serve time in federal prison, according to the release. The U.S. Attorney’s Office said seven other co-defendants have been convicted, and three of them have been sentenced to time behind bars in federal prison.
That includes a pair of Lexington residents, 32-year-old Chelsea Grace Wynn and 29-year-old Nehemiah Jimmy Mayes III, according to the release. Wynn was sentenced to 220 months in federal prison, while Mayes was 170 months, the U.S. Attorney’s Office said.
Josiah Daniel Dailey, a 38-year-old Aynor resident, was sentenced to 63 months in prison, according to the release.
The U.S. Attorney’s Office said that all of those sentences, including Newman’s, will be followed by five years of court-ordered supervision — and there is no parole in the federal system.
This case was investigated by the ATF, the Lexington County Sheriff’s Department, and the South Carolina Department of Corrections Office of Inspector General.
