An Alto man has been sentenced to a significant prison term due to drug trafficking violations in the Eastern District of Texas. The Acting U.S. Attorney Abe McGlothin, Jr. announced that Robert Jessie Martin, 47, received a 220-month sentence in federal prison. U.S. District Judge J. Campbell Barker delivered the sentence on April 17, 2025, and ordered the forfeiture of Martin’s 75-acre property in Cherokee County to the government.
Court documents revealed that Martin was involved in a conspiracy to distribute substantial quantities of methamphetamine, including over five kilograms of a mixture or substance containing methamphetamine and 500 grams or more of actual methamphetamine. Martin's property near Alto was used to operate rotary tablet pill presses, which produced hundreds of thousands of methamphetamine-laced counterfeit pills. These were distributed nationwide for profit. Martin was also responsible for recruiting and supplying distributors for the pills he manufactured.
Law enforcement agencies executed a federal search and arrest warrant on Martin’s property on July 11, 2023. They seized five firearms, five rotary pill presses, 111.22 grams of actual methamphetamine, about 7,669 grams of methamphetamine in powder form, and 29,283 methamphetamine-laced pills.
The investigation was a joint effort involving multiple agencies: Homeland Security Investigations; HSI Currency Narcotics Enforcement Team-Houston; the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives; the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration; the Cherokee County Sheriff’s Office; the Jacksonville Police Department; and the Texas Department of Public Safety. The case was prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Allen Hurst.