A former city councilman who admitted to having a drug problem will be sentenced in February after pleading guilty to conspiring to obstruct justice in connection with his involvement in a large local cocaine ring.

On Monday, John “Duke” Franklin Jr. told a U.S. District Judge in Knoxville that he had just completed a 28-day drug rehab program before pleading guilty to the crime for which he could receive up to five years in federal prison.

Mr. Franklin avoided responsibility for the much more serious charge that he helped his friend launder about $70,000 of drug money, a crime that could have netted him a prison term of up to 20 years.

Federal prosecutor Scott Winne declined to comment on why the government agreed to drop the money laundering charge, although the defense had vigorously campaigned against it in light of a U.S. Supreme Court ruling earlier this year that could make it harder to prosecute money laundering cases in the future.

The government also dropped another charge that Mr. Franklin lied to authorities when he told them he thought the money was simply a loan to help finance his friend’s legitimate business venture.

“We think it’s fair,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Scott Winne said of the agreement he struck with Mr. Franklin to settle the case.

Defense attorneys for Mr. Franklin also declined to comment on the terms of the plea agreement, which was read partly in open court Monday but will remain confidential. Federal plea agreements usually contain specific details of the criminal activities in question but often are kept under seal.

Mr. Franklin was just one of 41 people arrested May 14 on charges that they either ran or helped to run a cocaine ring that was responsible over the last year and a half for distributing at least 30 kilograms of cocaine a month in Chattanooga.

According to court testimony Monday, Mr. Franklin confessed to his involvement on the same day of his arrest, telling authorities that he helped co-defendant Michael Kelley cover up the origins of $70,000 that they seized from Mr. Kelley’s car in early March during a traffic stop.

At the time of the traffic stop, the FBI already had been monitoring the cocaine ring for several months. Authorities said Mr. Kelley intended to use the money to buy drugs, citing taped telephone conversations between Mr. Kelley and another co-defendant that indicated he had been a “runner” for the business, regularly driving to Atlanta with large sums of cash to buy drugs for distribution in Chattanooga.

To try to get the money back, authorities said Mr. Kelley enlisted the help of a local accountant to draw up a false loan document, something that Mr. Franklin then helped to “back date” and notarize in order to make the document look legitimate.

Mr. Franklin told investigators he thought the “favor” to Mr. Kelley was for a sum of money that was to be used for legal purposes, not to buy drugs — a statement authorities said was a lie.

Mr. Franklin knew all along about the cocaine business, authorities said, pointing to Mr. Franklin’s statements that Mr. Kelley had supplied him with cocaine free of charge for the past two years. The government never charged Mr. Franklin with a drug crime, but indicated his statements would be used against him if the case went to trial.

Tech Talk