Former Jackson County Sheriff’s Deputy Zachary Wester will spend the next 12 years in prison after being found guilty of planting drugs on multiple motorists.
Wester, 28, was sentenced Tuesday to 12-and-a-half years in state prison in connection with 19 guilty verdicts handed down in May.
They range from felonies such as racketeering, official misconduct, fabricating evidence, false imprisonment to misdemeanors such as possession of controlled substances and drug paraphernalia and perjury.
He faced 67 total charges but was cleared of most after a week-long trial in the state’s 14th Judicial Circuit, which covers Bay, Calhoun, Gulf, Holmes, Jackson and Washington counties.
The former patrol deputy for JCSO was accused of planting meth and paraphernalia in the vehicles of a dozen innocent motorists during traffic stops in 2017 and 2018.
Prosecutor Tom Williams asked that Wester be sentenced to 15 years in prison, a sentence that would have been nearly 10 years more than statutorily calculated, based on the charges and mitigating factors.
Williams told Circuit Judge James Goodman the scoresheet calculating sentencing doesn’t take into account the surrounding circumstances: That Wester’s falsified court records were used to convict people of crimes they didn’t commit in the same courthouse where he was found guilty.
Wester’s actions were “an egregious breach of the public’s trust,” Williams said.
“People voluntarily grant their government awesome powers they deem necessary for public safety and protection,” he said. “With that great power comes great responsibility. The defendant made choices to violate that trust and committed crimes against those people he was sworn to protect.”
maybe when he gets out , someone can pay him a favor and lock his ass up for another 12, maybe plant something on him , or better yet , remove him from the public so there wont be any more of his stupid criminal shit to deal with .. we can hope
Damn right! That bastard got off easy.
He may not survive in Prison.
If that becomes the case , we should rejoice
He made his bed , let it serve as a warning to all the others pulling the same shit