JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – A former sergeant with the Nassau County Sheriff’s Workplace is ready to be sentenced Monday morning after pleading responsible to federal drug expenses.
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In accordance with the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Middle District of Florida, James Hickox faces a most penalty of fifty years in federal jail for expenses together with conspiring to distribute narcotics, conspiring to defraud america, and tax evasion.
The U.S. Legal professional’s Workplace states that Hickox and his co-conspirator, Florida Freeway Patrol Trooper Joshua Earrey, engaged in corrupt actions from 2017 to 2023.
Hickox’s actions included stealing cash and unlawful medication taken as proof throughout prison investigations, offering unlawful medication like fentanyl and cocaine for distribution, and hiding over $420,000 from the IRS.
Hickox and Earrey reportedly stole greater than 1,000 kilos of marijuana from proof and offered it to others to promote, protecting up the theft with falsified paperwork indicating the marijuana had been destroyed.
News4Jax beforehand spoke with Curtis Fallgatter, a prison protection lawyer not related to the case in 2023, concerning the potential affect of Hickox’s actions. Fallgatter famous, “It may very well be pretty dramatic. As we stated, he’s been in narcotics and on the duty pressure with federal and state officers for over a decade.”
The consequences of Hickox’s actions have been evident in November 2023 when expenses have been dropped in opposition to two people in a case the place Hickox and Earrey would have been witnesses.
Diamonds Ford and her fiancé have been arrested after a Jacksonville Sheriff’s Workplace SWAT crew member was injured by a bullet Ford fired by way of a window. The officer survived, however Ford and her fiancé have been charged with tried homicide of a regulation enforcement officer.
News4JAX spoke with Ford after the fees have been dropped. She described the ordeal as “hell.”
“It’s been very onerous attempting to maintain the whole lot afloat figuring out that I couldn’t work as a pharmacy technician attributable to my expenses,” stated Ford. “I’ve skilled continually on the lookout for jobs and so they continually denied me due to my background due to these expenses.”
The State Legal professional’s Workplace, in its disposition dropping the fees, famous that Hickox used a confidential supply to conduct undercover buys at a home on Rutledge Pearson Drive and arrange a drug raid with JSO SWAT’s assist.
The disposition said, “Given the character of the fees, Earrey and Hickox are not obtainable as state witnesses. Extra importantly, the allegations in opposition to Earrey and Hickox increase important questions concerning the occasions main as much as the execution of the search warrant that led to the capturing.”
Hickox is anticipated to be sentenced Monday at 9 a.m. on the federal courthouse in Jacksonville. He faces a most penalty of fifty years in federal jail, with a minimal necessary sentence of 5 years.
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