Drug Traffickers Ordered to Jail

By Mike Donoghue
THE RUTLAND HERALD
Two people, including a convicted Rutland County arsonist, wanted for a major drug trafficking investigation have been ordered jailed.

Steven T. Browne, 37, of Shoreham, and Kayla Ramos, 22, of Rutland, are charged with knowingly and intentionally possessing cocaine, fentanyl and heroin on Oct. 25, 2021, with intent to distribute each. The grand jury also filed a forfeiture notice requiring the defendants to surrender proceeds from their drug business.

Middlebury Police reported officers seized more than 1,800 bags of suspected fentanyl/heroin and more than 3 ounces of cocaine from a hotel room at the Courtyard by Marriott on U.S. 7 where the two suspects were staying last fall, court records show.

The couple also tried to illegally re-enter the room after police had secured it and were seeking a search warrant, court records show. As the Middlebury criminal investigation evolved the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration took the lead.

Browne was supposed to be staying 24/7 with his mother, Karen Browne in Shoreham as conditions imposed in some state court cases, but investigators could never find him after filing a federal criminal complaint in U.S. District Court on March 24.

Ramos also had been sought for almost three months. Ramos has listed her residence as the Rodeway Inn in Rutland for five months through a state taxpayer-subsidized program, officials said Monday.

The DEA later obtained an indictment against the pair on May 5, but they remained on the run until last week when arrested at a campground in Colchester, officials said.

Colchester Police said it was investigating a possible hit-and-run accident involving a car registered to Browne’s mother from Shoreham. While checking with her, Colchester Sgt. Michael Fish learned her son had the suspect car and was living in a tent at the Malletts Bay Campground near Bayside Park.

Fish located Browne at the campground later Wednesday morning. While processing Browne at the police station, Fish determined his companion also had a federal arrest warrant. A short trip down the street from the police station to the campground netted Ramos, Fish said.

Browne has a lengthy history of abusing controlled substances, particularly opiates going back at least to 2005, according to federal court records. A prosecutor wrote Browne appeared to be under the influence of opiates when arrested by Colchester Police.

Both Browne and Ramos pleaded not guilty to the federal charge when they appeared for a joint virtual hearing in U.S. District Court in Burlington last week. Browne was jailed at the Northwest State Correctional Facility in St. Albans, while Ramos was detained at the Chittenden Regional Correctional Facility in South Burlington.

During a detention hearing on Monday, Browne agreed to remain in custody. Defense lawyer Robert Katims said his client has some state warrants pending that he needs to resolve before they develop a possible release plan and come back to court.

During the hearing for Ramos, defense lawyer John-Claude Charbonneau, of Rutland, said Valley Vista, a drug treatment center, agreed to admit her when a bed becomes available roughly in about a week. He asked Ramos to be released and allowed to live at the Rutland hotel pending admission at rehab. Her brother was supposed to be living with her at the Rodeway Inn, but Charbonneau noted as of the weekend he was at the Marble Valley Correctional Facility.

As an alternative, Charbonneau proposed his client be released when the bed becomes available at Valley Vista in Vergennes in that she goes directly there from prison. He said Valley Vista would work on finding a possible sober house for Ramos to live once her inpatient treatment ended. He did note that she had detoxed since her arrest and her condition has been stabilized with medication.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Matthew Lasher objected to both proposals and that more time was needed. He also was concerned that Karen Browne, the co-defendant’s mother, had agreed to drive Ramos to rehab. Lasher questioned her trustworthiness because her son was missing from her residence where he was under court-order to live full-time.

Magistrate Judge Kevin Doyle said he was concerned by both release plans. He called the first plan “risky.” For the second plan, Doyle said he did not want to have a provisional release and learn the bed was not available in a week, leaving Ramos in limbo.

He urged Charbonneau, a former federal prosecutor to come back to court Valley Vista reported the vacancy and a plan can be presented. Doyle said he was concerned because the pre-trial interview report showed Ramos, a 2018 Otter Valley graduate, had been an IV heroin user since she was 14 years old.

Doyle made no promises about a release, but said he would weigh the updated information.

Browne is well-known to federal authorities. Browne, who was living in Middlebury, has a 2014 arson conviction for a $102,302 fire at Curtis Auto Sales on U.S. 7 in Pittsford in July 2011, court records show.

A day after the fire, he was found at a Rutland bank attempting to pass a check from the business and was using a 2005 Honda Accord missing from the dealership, city and state police said at the time.

Browne initially was expected to receive a five-year federal prison sentence for torching the auto dealership, but it was adjusted to 31 months because the Bureau of Prisons would not give him credit for 29 months while in state custody, records show. Judge Christina Reiss also imposed a restitution order.

Browne violated the terms of his federal supervised release at least three times. He got 90 more days added on in June 2017 for failure to make any restitution and for testing positive for heroin twice and testing positive for marijuana at least seven times, records show.

The second violation came later that year for using cocaine, heroin and buprenorphine, but in October 2017 he was allowed to go to Valley Vista in Bradford for drug treatment. He soon relapsed by using cocaine, heroin and buprenorphine, failed to get tested, and he failed to connect with his probation officer or with substance abuse counseling. He was eventually sentenced to 14 more months in federal prison.

Browne has arrests in four states: Vermont, New Jersey, Florida and New Hampshire, including a theft conviction in the Granite State on April 7, records show.

He is out on a myriad of pending state charges in Vermont, including an October 2020 incident that led to a charge of assault and robbery with a weapon that prosecutors want him treated as a habitual offender, if convicted, court records show.

Ramos was found with used needles in her tent in Colchester when arrested, records show. She also had several empty baggies associated with heroin/fentanyl, officials said.

Investigation suggests Ramos was assisting Browne in avoiding the federal arrest warrant, court records show. While she does not have a substantial criminal record, “her participation in the use and distribution of controlled substances appears to have been long-standing at this point,” court papers note.

The drug case

Middlebury Police reported officers responded to a 911 hang-up call at the hotel about 3:51 a.m. on Oct. 25, 2021. The room was registered to Browne, who town police knew from various interactions, court records show. One of those came when Officer Casey Covey arrested Browne on a charge of suspected driving while under the influence on June 16, 2020, police said. Police also seized 627 packets of heroin/fentanyl, $1,865 in currency and a ledger that appeared to show distributions of controlled substances, records show.

Covey also spotted an uncapped used syringe in their room on the floor, a metal spoon with a bent handle on the bed, drops of blood on sheets and the carpet and various injection sites on the arms of both Browne and Ramos. Police seized the room and had the hotel change the door lock.

Browne was taken to the police station, processed, and was released about 7:01 a.m. He received a citation to appear in criminal court at 12:30 p.m. that day for violating his earlier release conditions.

About 9:50 a.m. the inn staff called Middlebury Police to report Browne had returned and was trying to get access to his room. Yellows police tape had been removed, but the red police evidence tape remained on the cracks of the door. Ramos also later arrived.

Marriott employees reported seeing a man in a red jacket putting up a ladder to a motel room and Ramos carrying a screen. Investigation revealed they had tried to enter the wrong room and they left upon orders from an employee. Police said Ramos returned about 2:16 p.m. and told staff that Middlebury Police had released the hotel room and she wanted access. Officer Daniel Ailinger told Ramos she would be arrested if she attempted to access the room again. He stood by while the final steps of securing the search warrant were completed.

Besides the 1,860 bags of heroin/fentanyl and 3.35 ounces of cocaine, Middlebury officers also seized two electronic scales. They also confiscated five bottles of methadone that were prescribed to a member of the motel staff and had been reported stolen, police said. Also seized were four more bottles of methadone prescribed to the staff member’s father and believed stolen, police said.

The staff member and her father later provided sworn verbal statements that the methadone had been stolen from their car sometimes on Oct. 25, 2021, the DEA said. They had provided Browne and Ramos a ride from a business on U.S. 7 to Court Street Extension during the early morning hours of Oct. 25, 2021.

The employee claimed Ramos had asked to have a key made for the new lock on the door of the room where she and Browne had been staying, police said.

Browne apparently learned earlier this year the DEA had taken the lead in the case when federal agents went to his mother’s home in Shoreham to look for him. His mother claimed he was at work “but could provide no substantive details about where he is supposedly employed,” Lasher wrote in court papers.

Lasher said a defense lawyer for Browne in his state proceedings arranged for his client to surrender at the federal courthouse in Burlington on April 18. Browne failed to show. Browne’s lawyer subsequently set up a surrender for April 19. He was again a no-show, Lasher said. Brown remained on the run for seven more weeks.