By Guy Leonard, County Times
HOLLYWOOD, Md. (July 10, 2008)—Robert M. Scriber, 35, from Lexington Park was sentenced Monday to 10 years in prison in the Maryland Department of Corrections for two convictions of possessing and dealing cocaine to a confidential police informant back in February.
The distribution conviction netted Scriber six years in jail, while the distribution charge totaled up to four years of incarceration.
Both terms were to be served consecutively, according to the orders of Circuit Court Judge C. Clarke Raley who handed down Scriber’s sentence.
Scriber, who had other convictions for burglary and drug possession, admitted that much of his life and been wasted on drugs and his admitted addiction to them.
His lawyer, Cynthia Panos, argued that he was not a hardcore drug dealer, rather he dealt drugs to support his own habit.
If he were to break the cycle of addiction, she said, he would not be apt to sell narcotics.
“I chose to be with the wrong people who had the same problem and not the solution,” Scriber said.
Raley also sentenced an admitted longtime drug addict for his conviction on being caught with a large amount of narcotics he was intending to sell.
John Colleary, 54, of Valley Lee received a sentence of four years in the Department of Corrections for his dealing of narcotics to help pay for rent on a property he had acquired on the St. Mary’s River.
“I got in a financial bind a year ago and I made a bad choice,” Colleary told Raley during his sentencing. “I got caught; I’m guilty and I deserve to go to jail.”
Raley, who was familiar with Colleary’s long past association with drug use, lamented the defendants addiction problems and what it had cost him.
“He’s 54 years old and he’s going to prison,” Raley said. “It’s pretty sad when you think about it; I hope this is the last time.”
Colleary was caught in July of last year with narcotics and $3,381 in cash, according to State’s Attorney Richard Fritz.
“He’s been in the business,” Fritz said of Colleary’s past with narcotics. “He’s more than the boy driving down the street with a bag of marijuana and few ounces of cocaine in his pocket.”
Agnes Dickerson, 44, of Clements was also sentenced to one year in the county detention center for simple possession of just 2.2 grams of cocaine.
She received 138 days credit for time she had already served.