Hagerstown man admits to federal drug charges, supplying other local dealers

A Hagerstown man has pleaded guilty to drug charges after authorities say he was using a storage facility unit in Hagerstown to weigh and package the narcotics, according to his plea agreement filed in U.S. District Court.

Thamar Smith, 48, pleaded guilty on Wednesday to conspiracy to posses with intent to distribute 100 grams or more of heroin and 40 grams or more of fentanyl, according to the document, which states that Smith also admitted supplying two other Hagerstown drug dealers.

Smith faces a minimum of five years in federal prison and a maximum of 40 years and a $5 million fine, the document states.

If the court accepts the plea agreement, Smith would be sentenced to seven years and eight months in prison, followed by four years of supervised release. Sentencing is scheduled for Oct. 7, according to a news release from the U.S. Attorney's office in Baltimore.

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A stipulation of facts attached to the plea agreement and signed by Smith states that a customer of a storage facility in Hagerstown made an anonymous complaint that they suspected someone had made a drug transaction at one of the units.

Police installed a motion-activated camera outside the unit and saw Smith accessing it 39 times between March 20 and April 24, 2019, and weighing and packaging suspected narcotics for distribution. Based on the size of the bags visible to the camera during that period, Smith "obtained at least 250 grams of narcotics during his visits," the document states.

Police said they learned Smith was supplying drugs to twin brothers Tyler and Edward Ware, and that the GPS tracking device installed on his SUV showed that it stopped outside Tyler Ware's home at least 30 times between April 8 and May 8 of 2019. There were at least 714 contacts between cellphones associated with Tyler Ware and Smith between April 13 and May 31 of that year, according to the document.

The 35-year-old brothers each have each pleaded guilty to conspiracy to distribute 40 grams or more of fentanyl, according to Alexis Abbott, spokeswoman for the U.S. Attorney's office. She said no sentencing dates were set in their cases.

During a search of Smith's storage unit police found 15.4 grams of heroin, 8.9 grams of a mixture of heroin and fentanyl, digital scales, plastic bags and a jar of a suspected cutting agent, the news release states.

Smith's case is part of an Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Force investigation, according to the release, in which U.S. Attorney Erek L. Barron commended the federal Drug Enforcement Agency and the Washington County Narcotics Task Force for their work in the investigation.