A Vermont man with a prior record landed a four-year prison stint after feds nailed him for gun and drug raps, officials said yesterday. Jeffrey Baird, 43, got the book thrown at him in federal court in Springfield, Mass., for having a revolver and ammo on him, and slinging meth with intent to distribute, according to the U.S. Attorney's Office for the District of Massachusetts.
While cruising north on Route 91 in Northampton back in December 2021, Baird got pulled over with faux plates, the gun, ammo, and plenty of meth in tow, prosecutors detailed; Baird, a convicted felon who should've been steering clear of firearms, was packing heat—though a search of his vehicle revealed the evidence that would land him back behind bars, a revolver alongside five rounds of ammunition were stashed in the car, and they didn't stop there, finding another trio of bullets on Baird himself, nestled in his Hell’s Angels vest with a hefty 207 grams of meth in a Ziplock bag, which was valued between $6K and $10K, officials noted.
Baird's rap sheet already featured firearms offenses which meant he had no business with the revolver and bullets found during the traffic stop, the Acting U.S. Attorney Joshua S. Levy and ATF and state police bigwigs pointed out. The hardnosed U.S. District Court Judge Mark G. Mastroianni imposed the sentence along with three years of supervised release after Baird threw in the towel and pleaded guilty in January 2024.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Deepika Bains Shukla, who heads the Springfield Branch Office, quarterbacked the prosecution, putting a pin in Baird's story of crime, the endgame being a four-year timeout in federal lockup, and after that, he'll still have Uncle Sam keeping an eye out with three years of supervised release, not to mention a mandatory $200 hole in his pocket with a special assessment fee, officials said in a statement.
