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Mario Galli III, 28, of Toms River, took a guilty plea Monday, admitting in U.S. District Court in Trenton that he had the gun and drugs when detectives from the Ocean County Prosecutor’s Office searched his and another home last September.
Detectives seized nearly a pound of the drug and a 9mm FEG Model PGK-9HP gun loaded with 12 rounds of ammunition during last fall’s raids, U.S. Attorney Craig Carpenito said Monday.
Galli was on supervised release at the time after serving 30 months for a 2016 conviction for conspiring to distribute more than a pound of cocaine, the U.S. attorney said.
Galli pleaded guilty Monday in exchange for leniency at sentencing to possession with the intent to distribute cocaine and being a convicted felon in possession of a firearm during a drug crime.
U.S. Judge Anne E. Thompson will add a mandatory five years for the gun conviction onto the drug term at a scheduled July 7 sentencing in Trenton, Carpenito said..
Galli also faces significant fines, he said.
Carpenito credited members of the FBI’s Organized Crime Task Force and investigators from the Ocean County Prosecutor’s with the investigation leading to the guilty plea, secured by Senior Litigation Counsel V. Grady O’Malley of his Organized Crime/Gangs Unit in Newark.
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