Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, July 15, 1994 TAG: 9407150081
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: MICHAEL STOWE STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
U.S. District Judge James Turk also ordered Henson to pay a $2,500 fine.
Henson was convicted in November of operating a 28,800-gallon illegal distillery made of 36 casks. The moonshine maker was hidden in a 40-by-90-foot shed about 100 yards from a house Henson was renting at Smith Mountain Lake in Pittsylvania County.
James E. Calhoun Jr., an investigator for the state Alcoholic Beverage Control Board, testified Thursday that the still and the storage building probably cost $50,000 to build.
That's peanuts, though, when one considers that federal authorities believe the 36-pot still could have produced up to $5 million in illegal whiskey in one year and defrauded the government of up to $4 million in taxes.
But Calhoun said Thursday that police discovered the still before Henson was even able to recover his start-up costs.
There was plenty of circumstantial evidence that connected Henson with the still: his handprint on a bag of yeast and two parts of the still; a huge jump in his electric bill when the still began operating; and empty bags of sugar in the back of his truck.
Previously, the largest illegal moonshine operation uncovered in Virginia was a 24-pot still found in Franklin County in 1972.
But the illegal whiskey wasn't what landed Henson's case in federal court. It got there because federal authorities linked Henson to a drug ring that formed a pipeline to bring hundreds of pounds of marijuana from Texas to Southside Virginia.
On Jan. 6, 1993 - less than two weeks after the illegal still was discovered, they raided Henson's house - where they found marijuana plants, traces of cocaine, numerous firearms and a large quantity of marijuana.
Federal authorities believe the 10-man drug ring used cash from gambling houses and moonshine operations to buy drugs - about $7 million from 1989 to 1993 - and bring them to Virginia.
Henson was convicted on the drug and weapon charges after a four-day trial in April, while the nine other defendants in the case pleaded guilty to a variety of weapon and drug charges.
Luther Reeves Sigmon, the ringleader of the group, received the harshest penalty: He was sentenced to 10 years in prison.
Henson's sentence was based on a probation officer's report that determined he was responsible for distributing more than 204 kilograms of cocaine and marijuana. The eight-year prison term could have been much longer if Turk had sustained a motion by U.S. Attorney Joe Mott that said the actual weight of the drugs was closer to 500 kilograms.
"I have a feeling that you are responsible for considerably more drugs," Turk said, "but I'm going to give you the benefit of the doubt."
Henson's attorney, Glen Berger, asked Turk for a light sentence, maintaining that his client had nothing to do with the drug ring.
"He's a moonshiner. He's admitted that he's a moonshiner, and he should be sentenced for that," Berger said.
by CNB