Judge denies defendant’s efforts to throw out wiretap in Chattanooga cocaine-trafficking case

Jumoke Johnson is led away from the bench by a bailiff after Judge Christie Sell doubled his bond and ordered him taken into custody on May 4, 2012.

Juanzell Jenkins

A federal magistrate judge has denied requests by a main defendant in a 34-person cocaine-trafficking conspiracy to throw out wiretap information because of errors in the warrant application.

U.S. Magistrate Judge Bill Carter said in a hearing Wednesday for a different defendant that he “did not find anything wrong with the wiretaps.”

Attorneys for defendant Jumoke Johnson Jr. had argued in a June 25 hearing that warrants written by Chattanooga police officer and Drug Enforcement Administration agent James Hixson were either “sloppy” or possibly illegal. Those errors, intentional or otherwise, Johnson’s attorney told the judge, meant the evidence obtained should be thrown out.

Carter found only one error, a misplaced reference to the date of the wiretap, in the documents and ruled against Johnson.

Johnson was among 34 charged in the cocaine trafficking conspiracy in November. At least 20 have since pleaded guilty. Of those already sentenced, one received a 10-month prison term, while the defendant in the most severe crime, a carjacking connected to the conspiracy, received an 11-year sentence.