I think you're right about meth at least when it comes to Mark Farmer.
Farmer's indictment suggested that he made $720,000 from drug sales in less than 4 months (August 2018 to November 2018). However, he only admitted to selling between 2500 and 5000 units of anabolic steroids in his plea agreement. That simply did not add up.
After a little digging, I realized that the $720,000 figure represented drug sales from EVERYONE involved in the conspiracy.
Just to be clear, Farmer was NOT involved in selling methamphetamine.
However, at least one of his customers -- remember Farmer distributed steroids to other drug dealers -- was also a meth dealer.
The feds claimed that Farmer "knew or reasonably should have known" that he was doing business with a meth dealer.
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The meth sales by another member of the conspiracy could reasonably account for a large portion of the $720,000.
It could also explain why the prosecutors and judge pushed for such a harsh prison sentence.
Farmer probably was not the target of the investigation. He was just unfortunate fallout from a broader meth distribution investigation.