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ALPENA -- An admitted drug distributor will spend seven years in prison after pleading guilty in August to attempting to deliver about 400 doses of methamphetamine in Alpena.
Judge Ed Black on Monday in Alpena's 26th Circuit Court sentenced Donald Grooms, 40, to seven to 20 years in prison for delivering meth, with credit for 261 days already served.
Police found 100 grams of the drug in a vehicle when police stopped Grooms and two other people in January. Co-defendants Lacey Roskey and Justin Shipp, arrested with Grooms, pleaded guilty to drug charges earlier this year.
Had police caught Grooms with cocaine or fentanyl, he would have received half as much prison time because of laws mandating strict sentencing in meth cases, defense attorney Rick Steiger said.
Also in court on Monday:
∫ Scott Henning, arrested in August 2020 after police said they found hallucinogenic mushrooms growing in the bedroom of his Hubbard Lake home, plans to accept a plea deal and anticipates a prison sentence, his attorney said.
∫ Tony Parris, a former captain at the Wilson Township Fire Department accused of sexually assaulting a girl beginning when she was 12, ignored the advice of several attorneys and declined a plea deal that would have sent him to prison for 12 years for multiple counts of first-degree sexual assault of a minor. Parris is scheduled to go to trial next week. If found guilty, he could be sentenced to at least 25 years and up to life in prison.