The owner and manager of an East Central motel have been sentenced to years in prison for their part in a drug trafficking scheme.
The owner of the motel, Pragneshkumar Patel, a 36-year-old from Mobile, Alabama was sentenced to 30 months in prison, ordered to pay $40,000 in fines and $9,000 in restitution and made to forfeit the motel. He has pleaded guilty to “maintaining a drug-involved premise.”
The motel manager Johnathan Craft, a 37-year-old Albuquerque man, was sentenced to 70 months in prison. He has pleaded guilty to conspiracy and being a prohibited person in possession of a firearm.
Federal prosecutors said Patel leased the Best Choice Inn to Kamal Bhula from March 2018 to June 2019. During that time, Craft lived and worked at the motel on Central near Louisiana as a manager and claimed to be in charge while Bhula was away. He also sold drugs from his room and allowed others to do the same.
“The Best Choice Inn gained profits by imposing a ‘visitor fee’ on individuals who frequented the establishment,” the U.S. Attorney’s Office for New Mexico wrote in a news release. “As a manager, Craft knew that many of the people for whom a visitor fee was imposed specifically frequented the business to engage in illegal activity, including selling and using drugs. As the owner, Patel profited from the visitor fees imposed on those using and selling drugs at the Best Choice Inn.”
Patel and Craft were initially charged—along with Bhula and two other men—in June 2019 with multiple crimes, including sex trafficking.
Bhula has pleaded guilty to maintaining a drug-involved premises and is awaiting sentencing. Co-defendents Willie Horton pleaded guilty to maintaining a drug-involved premise and aiding and abetting and Eddie Hill pleaded guilty to interstate and foreign travel and transportation in aid of racketeering enterprises
The Drug Enforcement Administration investigated this case along with the New Mexico Attorney General’s Office, the Albuquerque Police Department, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the U.S. Marshals Service, the Bernalillo County Sheriff’s Office, New Mexico State Police and Homeland Security Investigations. Assistant United States Attorneys Letitia Carroll Simms and Jack E. Burkhead prosecuted the case.
“Drug traffickers exploit vulnerable members of our community to generate profits,” said U.S. Attorney Alexander Uballez in the press release. “These individuals face enough challenges without predatory business owners using addiction to drive corporate profits. When this greedy out-of-state hotel owner capitalized on the desperation of the most marginalized New Mexicans to line his own pockets, he lost his hotel, tens of thousands of dollars, and his freedom.”