Sting operations snare Portsmouth man for drug trafficking in N.H., Maine

PORTLAND, Maine - A Portsmouth, N.H., man was sentenced Wendnesay in U.S. District Court for distributing fentanyl in Berwick.

Jerome Hovey Leclair, 39, will spend 38 months in prison followed by three years of supervised release. He pleaded guilty in July.

According to court records, in April 2023, under the direction of the Berwick Police Department, a cooperating source met with Leclair at his Portsmouth residence to discuss a future purchase of counterfeit Oxycodone pills. While in the apartment, the informant noted multiple plastic bags filled with small, blue pills, and Leclair gave the informant one pill as a sample. Later in June 2023, Leclair agreed to sell the informant 100 pills, offering to add 25 for free so that they could make more money selling them. The phone call was recorded, and investigators established surveillance in advance of the controlled purchase at Leclair's residence and near the agreed-upon meeting location. An undercover officer drove the informant to the buy.

Then in July 2023, an undercover officer contacted Leclair by text and negotiated the purchase of pills, meeting in Kittery to complete the transaction. The meeting was captured on video and audio.

And on July 7, 2023, the New Hampshire State Police stopped Leclair's vehicle in Seabrook, N.H. where Investigators recovered 500 blue circular pills from the vehicle along with approximately 30 grams of methamphetamine. Later in August 2023, the informant again contacted Leclair, negotiating and completing two more buys in New Hampshire.

The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration and Berwick Police Department investigated the case, with assistance from the New Hampshire State Police.