After 20 years, police catch up with drug dealer

By Zach Lowe
Staff Writer

Published September 23 2007

STAMFORD - Police finally had Eric Eure in custody, but he was placing a phone call to ask a friend for bail money when they realized they had a man who had evaded them for nearly 20 years.

Eure, who was carrying a birth certificate from New York and identification from Arizona, had refused to be fingerprinted, complaining of an unnamed hand ailment, records show.

A police captain went to the jail area and thought he recognized Eure as Wilbert Turner, a Jamaican drug dealer who was arrested about a dozen times in the 1980s and 1990s before disappearing.

Turner recognized Capt. Richard Conklin, too, but played coy, faking an American accent and carrying on about his hand ailment.

But he came clean when police told him he wasn't getting out on bond, Conklin said.

He broke into his Jamaican accent and greeted Conklin.

"Richie, mon, you lookin' good," he told Conklin, according to the captain.

Police booked Eure on drug charges, and he was convicted and sentenced to a five-year prison term this month. He likely will be deported to Jamaica for the fifth or sixth time in his life.

But prosecutors dropped about a dozen old criminal charges, including two gun charges, because key witnesses had died or moved. The case illustrates what can happen when local authorities hand suspects over to the federal government for deportation instead of aggressively pursuing criminal cases against them, experts said.

This will be Eure's first long prison sentence despite about a dozen arrests in Virginia, New York and Connecticut since 1986.

"He's played the system very professionally despite a bucket-load of arrests," Conklin said.

Eure, then known as Wilbert Turner, one of at least nine aliases he has used, served six months in a Connecticut prison on drug charges in 1986 and 1987, state Department of Correction records show.

He served two more months in 1989 for various motor vehicle charges, records show.

He racked up 18 more charges in 1990 and 1991, including one case in which he allegedly fired three gunshots at an acquaintance before pistol-whipping him near 80 Spruce St. on the West Side, court records show.

In those days, Turner was an active member of the Jamaican Posse, a West Side gang that sold marijuana and cocaine, police said.

He wore his hair in long dreadlocks and haunted neighborhood pool halls that have since closed. He lived in the old high-rise at 80 Spruce St. that symbolized the old West Side, police said. Dealers hid in the stairwells and menaced residents, according to Conklin and Lt. Jon Fontneau, who now is commander of the narcotics and organized crime squad.

When police spotted them outside, the dealers, including Turner, would rush inside and lock the door, Conklin said.

Conklin remembers once tackling one of Turner's underlings and wincing when he heard three gunshots he thought were aimed at him.

Turner had fired them into the air, perhaps as a warning to Conklin or to the dealer whom he had nabbed, Conklin said.

"That puts some adrenaline in you," Conklin said.

Turner skipped court appearances at least eight times in those two years, drawing eight separate failure to appear charges, records show.

He also was arrested for drug charges in New York in 1989. He wasn't convicted there until 1998 - the only felony conviction on his record since 1989 until this year, said Deputy Assistant State's Attorney David Applegate, who prosecuted Turner's recent case.

Sometime in 1991, he disappeared, probably to his native Jamaica, authorities said.

Turner returned to the U.S. and was deported again in 1992, according to a letter the Manhattan district attorney sent to Stamford police in the mid-1990s.

Immigration authorities found him selling weapons in Virginia in 1993 under the name Troy McDonald and deported him again, the letter states.

He didn't show up in court records again until 1998, when he was convicted on drug charges in New York. He served 90 days in prison and likely went back to Jamaica when released, Applegate said.

In all, authorities believe they deported Turner four or five times.

Paula Grenier, a spokeswoman for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, would not release Turner's deportation history, citing the agency's privacy rules.

Turner came back to Stamford sometime in 2006 without his dreadlocks or a scar he had on the right side of his face, court records show.

Authorities believe he had surgery to remove the scar and make his lips thinner, court records show.

His lawyer, Norman Pattis of Bethany, disputes that.

"They made up a whole alternative life for him," Pattis said. "They created a demon."

Turner befriended Thelma McRae, of 59 Dale St. on the East Side, and arranged for someone to send a package with 25 pounds of marijuana to her address in July 2006, court records show.

Authorities in Arizona tipped off police, and a Stamford officer dressed as a UPS delivery man dropped off the package.

McRae opened the door and signed for the package. Officers saw Turner at the back door and ran after him. He tried to escape, so police stunned him with a Taser, the first time the police department used its new stun guns, authorities said.

Police found a card from the Arizona UPS facility in Turner's hand, records show. His cell phone showed he had sent McRae a text message that day with the package's tracking number.

Turner's lawyer tried to have the case thrown out based on a controversial state court case, but a judge denied that motion.

Turner pleaded guilty to conspiracy to possess more than a kilogram of marijuana, second-degree forgery and failure to appear in court. The state dropped 17 other charges in the plea deal.

Prosecutors dropped all charges against McRae after concluding Turner probably tricked her, records show.

Still, Turner is finally serving a long prison sentence after more than 20 years of nearly constant criminal activity. He could be prosecuted at the federal level for illegally re-entering the United States.

"We're pleased about that," Conklin said. "This is an egregious case where he's entered the U.S. numerous times for the purpose of ongoing criminal activity."

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