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Omar “Stacks” Council, 41, is the latest of 23 defendants to take guilty pleas in exchange for leniency when he admitted participating in a trafficking network that flooded the streets of the state capital with heroin and other drugs amid shootouts with rival gang members
Council -- also known as "Snow" and "Y-O" -- must serve out the entire 160-month plea-bargained sentence because there’s no parole in the federal prison system.
A joint effort of local, state and federal law enforcement agencies led to charges against Council and other members of the rival gangs, all of whom are accused of distributing heroin by the pound in the city and were dubbed "war ready" by federal authorities. Several also were charged with weapons offenses.
The crew operated in the areas of Martin Luther King Boulevard, Sanford Street, Middle Rose Street, Southard Street, Hoffman Avenue, and Coolidge Avenue in Trenton, U.S. Attorney Craig Carpenito said.
Council was identified as a major dealer through court-approved wiretaps that captured calls and texts from his cellphone, as well as through undercover buys and confidential informants, Carpenito said.
“Council maintained close relationships with other conspirators, including Jakir Taylor, who obtained regular supplies of hundreds of bricks of heroin from defendant David Antonio, whom they referred to as ‘Papi’,” the U.S. attorney said.
“Council obtained supplies of heroin directly from Taylor and others (including supplies of heroin originating from Antonio), and regularly re-distributed that heroin to others in and around Trenton,” he said.
In addition to the prison term, Chief U.S. District Judge Freda L. Wolfson sentenced Council to five years of supervised release.
Carpenito credited several agencies with making the case, including:
- special agents of the FBI Newark Division’s Trenton Resident Agency
- special agents of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives Newark Division’s Trenton Field Office;
- Trenton, Princeton, Ewing and Burlington Township police;
- detectives of the Burlington County Prosecutor’s Office.
He also thanked New Jersey State Police, detectives of the Mercer County Prosecutor’s Office, officers of the Mercer County Sheriff’s Office and members of the New Jersey State Board of Parole.
This case was conducted, Carpenito said, under the Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Force (OCDETF) and the FBI’s Greater Trenton Safe Streets Task Force, a partnership among federal, state and local law enforcement agencies created to “enhance the identification, apprehension, and prosecution of individuals involved in gang-related activities, violent crime, and drug distribution in and around the greater Trenton area.”
Securing the pleas and sentences for the government are J. Brendan Day, the attorney-in-charge of Carpenito’s Trenton Branch Office, and Assistant U.S. Attorney Alexander Ramey of his Criminal Division in Trenton.
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