Leader of huge pot ring in Crawford County gets 10 years
Published: August 05. 2008 12:00PM

A Crawford County man was sentenced today to 10 years in a federal prison for running one of the largest marijuana-growing rings known to operate in northwestern Pennsylvania.

Gary B. Coulter, 54, had pleaded guilty to conspiracy to traffic in marijuana. The charge covered 1,183 full-grown marijuana plants — worth an estimated street value of $1.2 million — that drug agents seized from secret growing spots throughout eastern Crawford County in the summer of 2006.

The conviction for the trafficking charge carried a mandatory sentence of 10 years in prison because the marijuana plants numbered more than 1,000. Senior U.S. District Judge Maurice B. Cohill Jr., who delivered the sentence in federal court in Erie, said Coulter was deeply involved in the growing operation, in which five other defendants were also charged.

Coulter attended the sentencing in a wheelchair. He had a leg amputated after a motorcycle accident in 2005.

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