Mother Lode Drug Dealer Gets Hefty Sentence
Sonora, CA – A local drug dealer’s four recent felony convictions and history of prior strike, violent and drug-related convictions caught up with him yesterday in Tuolumne County Superior Court.
In addition to his most recent convictions, a lengthy criminal record of prior strike, deadly weapon assault, gang and drug-related convictions weighed in the sentencing of Dustin Leon Miller, 34, to 28 years and eight months in state prison. Miller will be eligible for parole after serving 80 percent of his prison term.
Just ahead of the four felony offenses for which he was tried last year, surveillance video caught Miller hiding more than six grams of methamphetamine in a speaker box at Black Oak Casino in December 2013. Due to Prop 47 law changes the charge was later reduced to a misdemeanor. In February 2014, police arrested Miller for possessing drugs for sale, along with a co-defendant, Christopher Goodrich. Later that month, after arresting Miller on a warrant police also charged him with bringing methamphetamine into the jail. During his drugs-for-sale trial last June, Miller, with help from a friend, Misty Verkuyl, sent a message on social media requesting people to come to court and make it difficult for co-defendant Goodrich to testify against him. Both were subsequently charged and stood trial for conspiracy and witness intimidation. Miller’s other two felony convictions resulted from his failure to appear on the final day of the drugs-for-sale trial, during which he was convicted in absentia and additionally cited on a felony failure to appear charge.
