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Bracelet may fit, but the penalty doesn’t EDWARD LEWIS OPINION

Monday June 29, 2009 | 01:00 AM

Dolly Smith will be wearing an ankle bracelet for the next three months. It’s the fancy bauble kind of bracelet.

Court records indicate Smith will have to wear the monitoring device for three of her 12-month sentence of house arrest.

That’s her punishment, imposed on Friday by Luzerne County President Judge Chester Muroski, for being involved in a drug cartel gang that controlled the heroin market in the Sherman Hills apartment complex in Wilkes-Barre.

Smith is a member of the Long Island Boys gang that was busted by the state Office of Attorney General in October.

Attorney General Tom Corbett came to town to make the announcement about the bust, which was made a few days before he was re-elected the state’s chief prosecutor.

Arrest records say the gang peddled in 3,000 to 5,000 heroin packets a week.

The street value of the heroin ranged from $60,000 to $100,000 a week.

The 38-page criminal complaint affidavit on the gangsters is certainly a page turner.

A Hollywood scriptwriter couldn’t make up the allegations that led to the downfall of the Long Island Boys.

I found myself reading the affidavit to find the reasons why Smith is permitted to watch television in the comforts of her Swoyersville home instead of inside a jail cell.

Smith is mentioned on just two pages of the 38-page affidavit.

No mandatory prison sentences

She played a minor role in the drug cartel that, according to the affidavit, took control of the heroin trade in the apartment complex after the killing of a rival gang member in June 2008.

Smith answered a telephone from an informant requesting to buy heroin on Oct. 2.

She negotiated a price for the heroin.

She traveled with one of the heroin sources in a Mercedes, meeting the informant outside a busy Wilkes-Barre Township supermarket.

A few days later, an informant called Smith requesting to buy heroin.

The informant was instructed to meet Smith inside the restroom of a busy Wilkes-Barre Township department store where the exchange took place on Oct. 7.

Authorities busted the Long Island Boys on Oct. 21 with the filing of arrest records.

Smith pleaded guilty to felony charges of corrupt organizations, criminal conspiracy to deliver heroin and delivery of a controlled substance on April 30.

According to her plea agreement, she faced a maximum sentence of 20 years on the charge of corrupt organizations, and a sentence of 10 years on the conspiracy and delivery charges.

Mandatory prison sentences didn’t apply to her case.

Fortunately for Smith, she wasn’t accused of delivering heroin near a school or a school bus stop, which upon conviction or guilty plea carries a mandatory sentence.

Smith was accused, arrest records say, of delivering heroin at places where parents take their children to shop for food, clothes and toys.

Muroski sentenced Smith to 12 months house arrest with the first three months under electronic monitoring, followed by a year of probation.

Authorities did a fantastic job in getting the heroin dealers out of Sherman Hills and retail stores.

It’s unfortunate that their hard and dangerous work isn’t justified by those who hold judicial power and state lawmakers who fail to include shopping centers under mandatory sentencing requirements.

About the Author

Ed Lewis covers police news for the Times Leader. Reach him at elewis@timesleader.com.

Ed Lewis covers police for The Times Leader. A graduate of Hanover Area, he earned a bachelor’s degree in criminal justice from King’s College where he also minored in political science. He interned for Congressman Paul E. Kanjorski in Washington, D.C., while in college, and formerly was an assignment editor and managing editor before finding his niche covering the very busy police beat. His hobbies include lifting weights, kickboxing, reading, carpentry, gardening, model trains and sports, especially football.