William Masengale
Two local men are set to plead guilty in Federal Court this week for selling large amounts of meth.
Prosecutors said William Masengale faces a minimum mandatory 10 years in federal prison and could get up to life.
Damien Gaddis is also facing 10 years to life.
On Jan. 12, agents using a confidential source set up a controlled meth buy from Masengale.
Masengale, 27, worked out a deal with the CS to sell six ounces of meth for $2,250.
It was arranged for the deal to go down at the Motel 6 in East Ridge.
Authorities said Samuel Swafford went with Masengale to the motel. Swafford gave Massengale a half ounce of meth as payment for brokering the drug transaction.
Agents said Swafford retrieved a backpack containing a large amount of meth from the trunk of their vehicle. Agents apprehended Masengale as he knocked on room 108. In his pocket, he had a set of digital scales and 44.5 grams of meth.
Swafford tried to flee, but was apprehended along with the backpack, which contained over 500 grams of meth.
In the Gaddis case, agents said he was involved in a drug conspiracy from August 2014 to February 2016.
On Feb. 27, 2015, a Red Bank officer stopped Gaddis' vehicle after he initially tried to get away.
Gaddis, who is 28, had $4,500 cash, which he said was the proceeds of the sale of a car. He also had a glass jar of meth, baggies, a night vision camera and digital scales.
On March 12, 2015, agents were conducting surveillance of Gaddis' residence on Signal Mountain. They stopped a vehicle that had just left the home and found resale amounts of meth and a digital scale. The female driver admitted just getting the meth from Gaddis and said she was on the way to transfer some of it to "Glenn."
She said Gaddis had more at this residence, but was about to leave. Agents stopped his vehicle and found meth, baggies, two sets of scales and $4,500 cash.
At his house, they located additional meth, drug ledgers, scales, baggies of pills and two boxes of 9mm ammunition.
He said he had been selling meth for about six months. He said he had worked his way up to eight ounces a week.
On Jan.8, 2016, police responded to a burglary call on Redlands Drive in Chattanooga. A caller said individuals were loading items from a home into numerous vehicles.
Police found Gaddis was standing by a ditch near 30 grams of meth. Large amounts of meth were on other individuals. Police found 58 grams of meth in the stolen GMC truck he was driving, 6.6 grams of marijuana, drug ledgers and $8,118 cash. A Mossberg rifle was also in the vehicle.
Damien Gaddis