Minnesota man pleads to Gogebic drug charges

By RICHARD JENKINS

rjenkins@yourdailyglobe.com

Bessemer — A Minnesota man told Gogebic County Circuit Judge Michael Pope he was delivering heroin to the area when the Gogebic Iron Area Narcotics Team arrested him in Ironwood last September.

Brandon Lee Bible, 35, of Minneapolis, made the confession Tuesday as part of his guilty plea to a pair of felonies.

Bible pleaded guilty to the delivery or manufacturing of heroin and resisting/obstructing police officers as part of a plea agreement.

In exchange for the pleas, a charge of tampering with evidence and a three charges from a second case involving contraband in the Gogebic County Jail will be dismissed at sentencing.

Prosecutor Nick Jacobs also agreed Bible’s two sentences will be served concurrently and he won’t bring any additional charges related to a series of controlled buys police completed prior to Bible’s Sept. 10 arrest.

Bible also acknowledged he was a habitual offender, which can extend the potential maximum sentence he faces. He testified a jury convicted him of being in possession of a pistol or assault weapon in Minnesota in 2012.

Bible was arrested at the welcome center on U.S. 2 in Ironwood Sept. 10, according to information presented in court.

He testified he picked up heroin in Duluth and drove to the welcome center, where he was waiting to hear from the person he was delivering it to.

“Police pulled up on me as I was smoking some of (the heroin),” Bible said.

He testified he put the foil he was using to smoke the heroin in his mouth and refused repeated commands to spit it out, the basis for his resisting and obstructing charge.

Bible is scheduled to be sentenced April 30.