BY JOHN HOPKINS
The Cincinnati Enquirer
Federal prosecutors worked Monday to link a Warren County real estate developer and his ex-wife to a drug network that moved hundreds of pounds of marijuana and kilograms of cocaine through Southwestern Ohio.
It was allegedly an elaborate operation of electronic scales, hidden truck compartments filled with cocaine and black duffel bags stuffed with compressed blocks of marijuana. Yet a simple black address book, with drug payments scribbled in pencil, kept account of it all.
The trial of Randall R. Neuhausser, 44, and his ex-wife Sheila Neuhausser, 34, both of Warren County's Union Township, began Monday in U.S. District Court in Cincinnati. They face charges for their alleged part in the distribution of drugs.
Others charged in the ring -- including Lebanon businessman James McCarty -- have already pleaded guilty. The trial is to resume at 9 a.m. today before Judge S. Arthur Spiegel.
It was Mr. McCarty who testified Monday afternoon that Mr. Neuhausser and his wife were accomplices in the drug ring. The 39-year-old testified that Mr. Neuhausser supplied him with marijuana from California and cocaine from Florida.
The operation started small, with Mr. McCarty selling the drugs to employees at his construction company, Pyramid Builders at 13 N. Cherry St. in Lebanon. He estimated moving a couple pounds of marijuana and an ounce or two of cocaine in the beginning.
"As time went on, business kind of picked up for me," a nervous Mr. McCarty told assistant U.S. attorney William E. Hunt during direct examination. "It kept getting bigger."
Mr. Hunt showed jurors Mr. McCarty's black book, which contained numerous names and drug transactions, including one marked "R Neu." It contained a final balance of $290,350 -- the figure Mr. McCarty said he owed Mr. Neuhausser for cocaine and marijuana. Also in testimony, Mr. McCarty said he would hand over drug money to Ms. Neuhausser when her husband wasn't home.
Before the Drug Enforcement Agency dismantled the ring earlier this year, it was thought to have moved as much as 720 kilos of cocaine and 3 tons of marijuana into the region since 1993.
Mr. McCarty, a high school graduate from Morrow and a father of five, testified that Mr. Neuhausser would deliver cocaine that was stuffed in a hidden compartment in the tailgate of a truck. The cocaine would come stamped with logos such as scorpions on the bags. Marijuana -- often 100 to 125 pounds of it -- was delivered in black duffel bags, he testified.
He testified to paying Mr. Neuhausser $1,000 to $1,200 for a pound of marijuana, and about $30,000 for a kilo of cocaine.
At one point, Mr. Neuhausser allegedly asked Mr. Carty whether he was interested in transporting drugs from Florida. He said he declined.
The network began to collapse shortly after a Price Hill man was stopped by authorities outside Lincoln, Neb., with 123.5 pounds of marijuana in his truck.
Defense attorneys for the Neuhaussers are expected to cross-examine Mr. McCarty today.
