Complaint seeks to take suspected drug money from father of NBA player from Kentucky
.jpg "The Department of Justice seal (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)")
Federal authorities have filed a complaint seeking to take nearly $50,000 in suspected drug money from the father of a professional basketball player from Kentucky.
Officers seized the money from Antonio Russell, of Louisville, in March as he prepared to board a flight from the Cincinnati / Northern Kentucky International Airport to Los Angeles.
Russell is the father of D’Angelo Russell, who was drafted by the Los Angeles Lakers in 2015 and has played for several National Basketball Association teams.
Nicholas Nimeskern, a task force officer with the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, said in a sworn statement that he and other police went to the airport March 12 after getting information that Antonio Russell was traveling on a “suspicious” itinerary.
One reason was that he had bought the ticket the day before.
Drug traffickers and couriers often don’t make travel plans far in advance because they get last-minute information about deals, Nimeskern said.
Nimeskern said he and other officers stopped Russell at the departure gate and he gave them permission to look in his Gucci backpack.
There was a total of $49,327 in two bundles of cash in the backpack, under four empty bottles of codeine, Nimeskern said.
Russell, 46, said he planned to use the money to buy a car. He did not have any information on his cell phone about the car, but said people in Los Angeles could help him find the car when he arrived, Nimeskern said.
Russell told officers he had a business helping NBA players get endorsement deals with companies such as Nike.
However, when Nimeskern asked Russell to name a few players he worked with, he didn’t. Russell was evasive and tried to change the subject, “making it appear that he was not telling the truth,” Nimeskern said in the affidavit.
Russell showed agents a bank account on his phone with a balance of almost $500,000, but couldn’t explain why it didn’t show deposits if it was his business account, Nimesksern said.
The agents later learned Russell’s son plays in the NBA and thought Russell might have shown them his son’s account, according to the affidavit.
Russell allowed agents to look at three cell phones he had. It appeared that messages and images had been deleted from text threads, and Russell would not allow agents to look at a fourth phone he had, which led agents to believe it held incriminating evidence.
The drug agents took the money and the phones. The seizure was justified on several grounds, Nimeskern said, including Russell’s travel plans, his vague explanations on the source of the money, his deleted messages, prior drug arrests and ties to ongoing investigations.
The affidavit said Russell is associated with heroin and methamphetamine trafficking in Kentucky and Indiana, but provided no detail.
Russell filed a claim with the DEA to get back the money.
This week, however, Assistant U.S. Attorney Rajbir Datta filed a civil action to forfeit the money to the government.
The complaint alleges that the money “was furnished or intended to be furnished in exchange for controlled substances, was proceeds traceable to such an exchange, or was intended to be used to facilitate the illegal sale of narcotics.”
The law allows authorities to seize cash and other property they believe is associated with illegal activity. That does not require filing criminal charges against a person; the complaint is against the property, not whoever had it.
There has been controversy surrounding civil forfeiture, with police arguing it helps in the fight against drug trafficking and organized crime, and critics arguing it violates peoples’ rights and distorts law-enforcement priorities.
There are no criminal charges against Russell in connection with the cash agents took from him.
Russell has not responded to the complaint, and efforts to reach him were not successful.
