A Queens man who worked as a disc jockey for Sirius XM was sentenced to eight years in prison for operating a drug trafficking scheme which ran between California and Hempstead.
In March 2021, members of the FBI Long Island Gang Task Force and the ATF Long Island Firearms Task Force executed numerous arrest and search warrants related to “Operation Honeycomb.” Forty defendants were indicted for allegedly selling narcotics in the Hempstead area, including nine charged as major traffickers.
As a result of the investigation, investigators determined that kilograms of cocaine and fentanyl originating in Southern California were being sent through the United States Postal Service to addresses in New York. The packages bound for Nassau County were sent to addresses along the route of Adrianna Lewis, a letter carrier for the USPS in Hempstead.
Lewis and Lance Holmes met in various places along the route to transfer the narcotics and the postal worker was paid $500 for every successful delivery.
The packages — all with the same weights — were shipped via priority mail, in medium flat rate postal boxes, and originated from shipping stores in California.
The people at the Hempstead addresses were not involved in the trafficking scheme.
Several packages destined for Hempstead and surrounding areas were intercepted from the mail-stream and K9 units from the Nassau County Police Department and New York State Police conducted sniff tests with the dogs returning positive alerts for narcotics.
On June 7, 2022, Holmes contacted the postal office to inquire about a parcel that was destined for a Manhattan address. The package containing two kilograms of cocaine was intercepted prior to him receiving it.
In total, ten kilograms of cocaine and one kilogram of fentanyl were seized during this investigation.
Holmes, also known as DJ Love Dinero, 42, of Hollis, Queens, pleaded guilty on March 25, 2024, before Judge David Sullivan to Operating as a Major Trafficker (a Class A-I felony), Attempted Criminal Possession of a Controlled Substance in the First Degree (a Class B felony) and Conspiracy in the Fourth Degree (a Class E felony). He was sentenced on October 22 to eight years in prison and five years post release supervision.
Lewis, 33, from Rockville Centre, pleaded guilty on December 19, 2023, to Criminal Facilitation in the Second Degree (a C felony), and was sentenced to five years’ probation on February 15, 2024.
“Lance Holmes played a major role in moving multiple kilos of cocaine and fentanyl from the West Coast right into our Hempstead community, disguising his illicit activity by exploiting our mail system with the help of a postal carrier,” said Nassau County District Attorney Anne Donnelly. “Together with mail carrier Adrianna Lewis, Holmes mailed the drugs to the addresses of unsuspecting homeowners where Lewis then intercepted the packages and provided them to Holmes for a price. Together with our partners, we will continue to shut down narcotics pipelines into Long Island and send the traffickers to prison.”