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[Southsider2k12]

http://www.indystar.com/article/20111025/N...t%7CFRONTPAGE33

DETROIT -- An 87-year-old Indiana man arrested with 104 bricks of cocaine in his pickup truck told a judge Monday that he was forced at gunpoint to carry the load.

During a boisterous appearance in court, Leo Sharp had trouble keeping quiet, even after he was warned that anything he said could be used against him. There were grins and occasional laughter from lawyers, spectators and U.S. Magistrate Judge Mark Randon.

Federal prosecutors wanted to keep Sharp locked up, but the Michigan City, Ind., man was released on bond three days after he was stopped for improper lane use while driving alone on I-94 near Chelsea, 60 miles west of Detroit.

With the help of a drug-sniffing dog, state troopers discovered 104 brick-sized packages of cocaine Friday, according to the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration.

"You're dealing with a man forced to do what I did by gunpoint," Sharp told the judge.

A criminal complaint signed by a DEA agent is thin on details, and there was no mention in court about Sharp's destination. The judge had to speak loudly after Sharp said he had lost some hearing during a war. Sharp did not elaborate.

Sharp asked that he be allowed to get medicine that apparently had been seized by officers.

"I could have a stroke," he said.

At another point, Sharp said he probably could read better than anyone in the courtroom and that he's writing a book. He "absolutely" promised to return to court on Nov. 10. "You're the boss," Sharp told the judge, who ordered a mental-health evaluation.

"I'm sorry, sir, to be so troublesome," Sharp said.

Outside court, he told The Associated Press he grows lilies on a 46-acre Indiana farm.

"I love plants. It's a serious love -- except the crap that makes you high," Sharp said. "I'm innocent. You'll learn about it."

Defense attorney Ray Richards said he thinks the amount of cocaine tops 200 pounds.

"This case is going to be challenging," Richards said.

DEA spokesman Rich Isaacson said he couldn't discuss details of the investigation but said the role of an 87-year-old man was unusual.

"Drug-trafficking groups use all kinds of measures to avoid detection by law enforcement. Using an older gentleman could be another strategy," he said.

[Southsider2k12]

http://abclocal.go.com/wls/story?section=n...&id=8590424

March 21, 2012 (CHICAGO) (WLS) -- Accused drug runners for Mexico's ruthless Sinaloa cartel don't often do television interviews. Then again, not many suspected drug mules are 87 years old. But Leo Sharp is 87 and he admits to being a drug mule, someone who smuggles cocaine on behalf of a supplier.

Sharp is a horticulturist.

"I'm known all over the planet-and I'm talking about all over the planet," he said. "I have customers in New Zealand, Japan."

Brookwood Garden, his 46-acre daylily farm in Michigan City, Indiana, is 2,500 miles from the coca fields of Colombia, South America. But according to Sharp, both plants bring pleasure. Daylilies produce one bloom a day. Coca plants produce cocaine.

"All God's plants that cheer people up are created for a purpose," Sharp said. "To take depressed peoples' minds and make them feel good."

Daylilies, Mr. Sharp's lifelong passion and profession, are legal. Cocaine is not.

According to an affidavit from a federal drug agent, last October Sharp's pick-up truck was stopped for an improper lane change on an interstate near Detroit.

"What happened was I was pulled over by a state cop because he wanted to put out a ticket and get a fine and of course he brings a dog," he said.

A drug-sniffing dog found the cocaine in 104 bricks. Sharp was arrested. He claims he had been recruited by one of his farmhands to transport cash.

"My workers are Mexican. That's the only people that'll do the work, and they go to church, and one of the guys they go to church with came over and asked me to do this. He asked me also if I would take drugs from Tucson to Detroit, Michigan and I said, the answer is no," said Sharp.

But he says they forced him to deliver the drugs or his family would be killed-something fugitive Sinaloa leader Joaquin Guzman Loera, known as "El Chapo," has been known to do.

Goudie: "Why would they have picked you to put this cocaine in your van."
Sharp: "Because an old man is not gonna be bothered by cops, driving through Arizona."
Goudie: "But you were bothered in Michigan."
Sharp: "I was busted up there, obviously."
Goudie: "Did you know that was cocaine in your van?"
Sharp: "I did. I did."

Federal prosecutors say Sharp wasn't forced to do anything that day in October and that he had done it before.

According to a newly filed indictment, Mr. Sharp is now accused of delivering cocaine on numerous occasions for the Sinaloa cartel - 670 kilos - between 2009 and last fall. Sharp is charged with 17 other men in a wide-ranging drug conspiracy.

Goudie: "Leo, are you worried about this thing in Michigan?"
Sharp: "Well, the answer is yes. But at age 87, I know, my doctor tells me that I will live to be 100. But I won't live to be 100 if I am sentenced to prison. I'm just going to end it all. Period."
Goudie: "What do you mean you're going to end it all?"
Sharp: I'm going to get a Goddamn gun and shoot myself in the mouth or my ear, one or the other...I won't live in a toilet with bars...ever."

Leo Sharp says he isn't a drug user himself; that he only took LSD once in 1965 and that it made him "crazy" for 24 hours. Other than legal issues he says he's in fine health.

Sharp's Chicago attorney Darryl Goldberg wasn't pleased to learn his client had spoken with the I-Team, but says he plans to put on a vigorous defense starting with Sharp's arraignment in Detroit Friday.