Lawyer tells judge his gangster client too incompetent and shouldnt go to jail
Please cut him a break, judge — he couldn’t even sell cheap cigarettes!
A suspected mobster, who once claimed he had “borderline mental retardation” to avoid jail for violating bail, should not get any time behind bars for selling untaxed cigarettes because he was lousy at it, his lawyer argued in court filings.
Bradford Wedra, who copped on May 16 to trafficking untaxed cigarettes, is to be sentenced Friday. He is one of 46 accused gangsters busted in August 2016 in an alleged racketeering conspiracy that spanned the East Coast.
But Wedra’s attorney, Michael Sporn, wrote in papers last week that his client had a role in the scheme just because of a capo’s pity.
Others involved in the alleged scheme “complained … they did not want to work with him. He was not reliable. He was not doing a good job. He was not good at selling,” Sporn wrote in a heavily edited filing.
The mobsters were right, the lawyer said — Wedra was a horrible hustler.
“Bradford did have trouble finding storefronts that would buy his cigarettes,” Sporn wrote, asking Judge Richard Sullivan for leniency. “He also did not receive cases alone … He returned some of the cartons. He kept some cartons for his personal use. Mr. Wedra did not excel as a trafficker in untaxed cigarettes.”
Prosecutors have recommended Wedra be sentenced to eight to 14 months.
Several months after his arrest, Wedra was almost thrown in jail because he failed six drug tests while out on bail.
Sporn convinced Sullivan to give him a second chance, claiming he had “developmental disabilities.”
“Mr. Wedra has some developmental disabilities. He has some learning deficits. This has plagued him his entire life,” Sporn claimed. “It has been documented by psychiatrists that he has borderline mental retardation. The fact of the matter is, he cannot read and is very limited in his ability to write.”
http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/nyc-crime/mobster-thinks-avoid-jail-incompetent-article-1.3684797
A suspected mobster, who once claimed he had “borderline mental retardation” to avoid jail for violating bail, should not get any time behind bars for selling untaxed cigarettes because he was lousy at it, his lawyer argued in court filings.
Bradford Wedra, who copped on May 16 to trafficking untaxed cigarettes, is to be sentenced Friday. He is one of 46 accused gangsters busted in August 2016 in an alleged racketeering conspiracy that spanned the East Coast.
But Wedra’s attorney, Michael Sporn, wrote in papers last week that his client had a role in the scheme just because of a capo’s pity.
Others involved in the alleged scheme “complained … they did not want to work with him. He was not reliable. He was not doing a good job. He was not good at selling,” Sporn wrote in a heavily edited filing.
The mobsters were right, the lawyer said — Wedra was a horrible hustler.
“Bradford did have trouble finding storefronts that would buy his cigarettes,” Sporn wrote, asking Judge Richard Sullivan for leniency. “He also did not receive cases alone … He returned some of the cartons. He kept some cartons for his personal use. Mr. Wedra did not excel as a trafficker in untaxed cigarettes.”
Prosecutors have recommended Wedra be sentenced to eight to 14 months.
Several months after his arrest, Wedra was almost thrown in jail because he failed six drug tests while out on bail.
Sporn convinced Sullivan to give him a second chance, claiming he had “developmental disabilities.”
“Mr. Wedra has some developmental disabilities. He has some learning deficits. This has plagued him his entire life,” Sporn claimed. “It has been documented by psychiatrists that he has borderline mental retardation. The fact of the matter is, he cannot read and is very limited in his ability to write.”
http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/nyc-crime/mobster-thinks-avoid-jail-incompetent-article-1.3684797
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