A street lieutenant in a crack cocaine gang, a police officer turned masked robber, a widow who spent her husband’s death payments on heroin. All are admitted criminals who have testified against five men accused of operating a million-dollar heroin ring in Northeast Baltimore.

A jury heard closing arguments Friday in the two-week federal trial and will decide whether it can trust the word of drug dealers, heroin addicts and rogue cops who testified as government witnesses.

“Have you ever seen a cast of characters like this?” defense attorney Robert Bonsib asked jurors. “Talk about a topsy-turvy world. It’s like being in ‘Alice in Wonderland.’ ”

At stake are decades in federal prison for the five men from Baltimore. Police say the drug crew led by Antonio “Brill” Shropshire, 31, emerged as the largest supplier of heroin to suburban Baltimore and Harford counties.

During the trial in U.S. District Court, prosecutors called 35 witnesses — including heroin buyers and wholesalers — who described a sophisticated drug ring that operated with impunity for years around The Alameda.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Derek Hines said the dealers earned more than $2 million and sold nearly 18,000 grams of heroin.

“They had a seven-year run, and how were they able to do it?” Hines asked jurors. “They were protected by a corrupt Baltimore City police officer.”

Former police Detective Momodu Gondo, 34, admitted to tipping off the alleged drug dealers to police whereabouts. He wanted to protect them from honest police who would arrest them and rogue officers who would rob them, Gondo said. He pleaded guilty to his crimes and is now facing up to 60 years in prison.

Prosecutors say Shropshire sold heroin with Antoine Washington, 27; Alexander Campbell, 29; Omari Thomas, 25; and Glen Kyle Wells, 31. The men all declined to testify.

The defendants are all charged with conspiracy to distribute heroin and face maximum sentences of 40 years or more.

The Baltimore trial provided jurors and spectators a look at the breadth of the opioid epidemic, which President Donald Trump declared a national public health emergency.

More than 60 people overdosed and 15 of them died from heroin traced back to the alleged drug dealers, police say.

Leon Koger told jurors he helped sell Shropshire as much as 500 grams of heroin at a time — a supply worth more than $30,000. Koger pleaded guilty to selling cocaine in another case. He awaits sentencing and testified, he said, in hopes of leniency.

Kenneth Diggins, 41, told jurors how he texted a 19-year-old woman and recovering addict, tempting her with the heroin she craved. He told jurors he bought six grams of heroin from the defendant Washington. He binged on the heroin and had sex with the teenager before she died in his basement. He was sentenced to a decade in federal prison and testified hoping for an early release.

The trial also revealed how a wiretap investigation into Gondo led investigators to a rogue unit within the Baltimore Police Department. Prosecutors said officers in the elite Gun Trace Task Force robbed drug dealers and innocent civilians for years. Four officers, including Gondo and his former police partner, Jemell Rayam, pleaded guilty to the racketeering conspiracy. Four more officers head to trial next year.

Rayam testified in the drug case too, telling jurors he helped Gondo and the defendant Wells rob a rival heroin dealer. Rayam pleaded guilty to his crimes and faces as many as 20 years in prison.

The trial brought jurors deeper and deeper into the underworld of Baltimore’s heroin trade — an urban business that relied on suburban customers from Towson, Perry Hall and Bel Air. Recovering addicts told how their use of prescription painkillers such as Percocet and Oxycontin led to the cheaper substitute of heroin. Some shopped each day for a $120 gram of heroin. They worked two jobs, borrowed money from parents and maxed out credit cards with cash advances to pay for the drugs.

There was the widow who cleaned houses and broke down in court, telling how she spent her husband’s death payments on heroin. There was the gymnast who became hooked on prescription painkillers after an injury and then resorted to heroin.

“Are they scared and embellishing? Maybe,” said Alfred Guillaume, the defense attorney for Shropshire. “If you’re caught red-handed as these people were, you don’t have a whole lot of options.”

tprudente@baltsun.com

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