PALATKA (Florida) DAILY NEWS

January 30, 2007

Evans gets 30 years; wife still awaits sentencing for labor camp role

By Ron Bartlett

The man who hired transients to work in his labor camps and paid them partially in crack cocaine was sentenced to 30 years Friday in a Jacksonville courtroom.

Ronald Evans Sr., 60, was convicted in August of 57 charges ranging from the violation of labor and environmental laws to drug dealing and witness tampering.

On Friday he was given a 30-year sentence before Judge Timothy Corrigan in U.S. District court in Jacksonville.

Evans’ attorney, Jacksonville-based William Kent, said that Evans will be appealing his sentence.

“He will be appealing, of course,” Kent said. “I’m not going to be doing the appeal. He will be hiring somebody else or the court will be appointing somebody n I’m not sure which. In Federal court you have to get an order from the judge permitting you to withdraw after sentencing. I expect that will occur.”

The Miami Herald reported that both labor camps Evans owned have been forfeited to the government and Evans’ wife, Jequita, a co-defendant, must pay $1.1 million in fines. She will be sentenced next month and faces a 10-year minimum sentence for conspiracy to distribute crack, one of 49 charges she was convicted of. Their son, Ronald Evans Jr., plead earlier last year to conspiracy to distribute crack cocaine and will receive his sentence alongside his mother.

“Because the sentencing went on longer than expected for (Evans Sr.), his wife and son’s sentencing was postponed to February 7,” Kent said.

Evans Sr. was convicted of operating a continuing criminal enterprise, conspiracy to distribute crack, trafficking in untaxed cigarettes, violating the Clean Water Act, violating the Migrant and Seasonal Farm Worker Act and avoiding financial reporting requirements. He was acquitted of a single charge of lying to a federal agency.

Evans’ most notable crime was the practice of hiring drug addicts and homeless men and putting them to work at one of his two labor camps, one in East Palatka and the other in New Grove, N.C.

Paying them minimum wage, he attempted to keep the workers indebted by charging $50 a week for room and board. At the end of each day, he would allow the workers to purchase, on credit, crack cocaine, cigarettes and beer.

On Friday, he faced a mandatory 20-year prison term for the continuing criminal enterprise conviction. Corrigan elected to give him 30.

“I had felt the judge would give him just the 20-year minimum mandatory,” Kent said. “The man’s 60 years old, so 20 years, 30 years it’s all kind of the same. It’s all academic.”