A retired Rocky Mount police officer who once carried a badge to protect his community was sentenced to nearly four years in federal prison after investigators say he spent years dealing cocaine, including a scheme uncovered when a trafficker in Richmond, Virginia, tipped off federal agents. Linc Oshea Brooks, 56, was still carrying his police shield and law enforcement ID card when deputies arrested him during a January 2023 traffic stop on Interstate 95, according to reporting from the Charlotte Observer.
U.S. Attorney Ellis Boyle did not mince words after the sentencing Friday, calling Brooks a “traitor” who thought the law did not apply to him, according to a statement from the U.S. Department of Justice. Brooks retired from the Rocky Mount Police Department in 2006, per the Charlotte Observer, which reported that witnesses linked him to large-scale cocaine trafficking dating back to the early 2000s, according to prosecutors.
A Highway Stop That Unraveled a Years-Long Scheme
The case against Brooks traces back to a routine-looking stop on Interstate 95 on January 11, 2023. Nash County Sheriff's deputies spotted Brooks committing several traffic violations before pulling him over, the Observer reported, and a K-9 alerted to drugs inside his car. Federal investigators determined Brooks had been driving along I-95 with the intent to deliver nine ounces of cocaine to Roanoke Rapids, North Carolina, according to the Department of Justice.
Deputies discovered 191 grams of cocaine in Brooks' vehicle, and he became combative during the stop before deputies restrained him, per the Observer's account. The Nash County Sheriff's Office Highway Interdiction Team, operating near mile marker 150, seized Brooks' 2020 GMC Denali truck as part of the stop, according to WSIC News.
A court-authorized search of Brooks' Rocky Mount property later turned up four guns, according to the Department of Justice. Two firearms were found in a shed alongside two digital scales with white residue and plastic baggies, while two more firearms were located in the master bedroom along with marijuana, the agency reported.
Investigation Traced Ties to a Virginia Trafficking Network
The roots of the federal case stretch back further than the traffic stop that ultimately brought Brooks down. Drug Enforcement Administration agents first identified Brooks' involvement in drug distribution in early 2022 while investigating a cocaine trafficker in Richmond, Virginia, according to the Department of Justice. A cooperating drug trafficker told federal agents that year that Brooks had been selling up to 5 kilograms of cocaine at a time since 2021, the agency said.
Nash County Sheriff Keith Stone said Brooks betrayed public trust by taking an oath to uphold the law and then engaging in the same illegal drug activity he was charged with stopping, per the Department of Justice's statement. The Nash County Sheriff's Office, the Drug Enforcement Administration, and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives all investigated the case, according to the Observer's reporting.
A Record of Prior Regulatory and Legal Trouble
Brooks' brush with law enforcement scrutiny did not begin with the 2023 traffic stop. In August 2020, the North Carolina Private Protective Services Board issued a cease-and-desist order against Brooks and Brooks Private Investigative Services for offering unlicensed private protective services, according to state board records reviewed by the North Carolina Private Protective Services Board.
Years earlier, in May 2015, Brooks had filed a federal civil rights lawsuit against the Dare County Sheriff in the Eastern District of North Carolina; that case was dismissed by summary judgment in August 2017, according to court records cataloged by Justia.
Brooks was ultimately charged with possession with intent to distribute cocaine and sentenced to nearly four years in federal prison, the Observer reported. The Rocky Mount Police Department, where Brooks once served, employs just over 150 officers in a city located about 60 miles northeast of downtown Raleigh, per the same Observer account. The U.S. Attorney's Office for the Eastern District of North Carolina, which prosecuted the case, handles federal criminal cases across 44 eastern counties stretching from the Research Triangle to the Atlantic coast, according to the Department of Justice.
