
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: THURSDAY, November 9, 1995                   TAG: 9511090050
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: C-3   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: JAN VERTEFEUILLE STAFF WRITER
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Short

CRACK DEALER SENTENCED

A woman who was acquitted in state court last year on charges of selling crack cocaine - after her look-alike sister claimed she was the one police saw dealing - will spend five years in prison on federal charges.

After her acquittal, Deborah Marshall was indicted this spring in a federal investigation. Because she cooperated with Drug Enforcement Administration agents, Judge Jackson Kiser sentenced her Wednesday to half of what otherwise would have been a mandatory 10-year sentence for dealing crack.

Marshall, 27, received crack from Charles A. Cotton Jr. and would pass it on to a distributor for sale to street dealers. Every seven to 10 days, Marshall received multiple-ounce quantities of crack, for which she charged $1,400 an ounce, according to court records. Marshall then would collect the money from the distributor and deliver it to Cotton.

Cotton was sentenced Wednesday to 15 years in federal prison on a crack-selling conspiracy charge, as well as for possession of a firearm in connection with a drug-trafficking offense. He had a gun in his car when arrested.

Marshall escaped state drug charges last year when her older sister - who could pass for her twin - came forward and testified that she, not Marshall, was the one police saw dealing crack. Because the undercover officer who made the buy insisted it was Marshall, prosecutors could not charge her sister after her testimony.

by CNB