- Rodney Gamby, left, was just indicted in the United States District Court in Cleveland. His old football teammate at the University of Toledo and former offensive lineman for the New England Patriots, Nick Kaczur, ratted him out after authorities intercepted a package of Oxycontin headed to Kaczur's Chagrin Falls house
Nick Kaczur is known for two things: starting on the offensive line of one of the best ever NFL teams and ratting on his partners after Oxycontin busts. A four-year starter at the University of Toledo, Kaczur was taken by the New England Patriots in the third round of the 2005 NFL draft. He went on to start 62 games, including the nearly-perfect 2007 season.
In early 2008, not long after that Super Bowl loss to the New York Giants, the 6'4, 315-pound tackle was arrested in upstate New York after cops found Oxycontin in his truck. But he flipped, cooperating with the feds to bust the guy who supplied him with the pills. He wore a wire, recording three drug-buys near the Patriots stadium for the DEA who swooped in on his dealer (read a Boston Globe story on that), and Kaczur went on with his life.
He was cut in 2011 after missing the entire 2010 season with a back injury and then moved to Chagrin Falls, about 35 minutes southeast of Cleveland. His career had stopped but his love of pills — and desire to help law enforcement after getting caught for pills — did not.
Last December, a one-pound package that "sounded like pills or candy when shaken" was sent from Las Vegas to Kaczur's Chagrin Falls home, but a United States Postal Inspector in Cleveland intercepted it before it could get there. It was addressed to him at his Messenger Road home; the return address had the same info. It was Oxycontin. When confronted by the authorities, Kaczur did like he did in 2008: he dimed out the guy who gave it to him.
This time, it was Rodney Gamby who took the fall. A former teammate of Kaczur's at the University of Toledo, an indictment against Gamby was just filed in the federal court in Cleveland for two counts of possession with intent to distribute Oxycodone and two counts of using the mail to distribute. Gamby was kicked off the Rockets football team in 2005 after an arrest for selling the same drug.
According to the affidavit from the postal inspector, here's how things went down:
December 11, 2012: The postal inspector noticed a suspicious package sent from Las Vegas (described above) to Kaczur, and went to his home with deputies from the Cuyahoga County Sheriff's Department to ask him questions. They advised him the interview was completely voluntary, but he agreed to both talk and have his package searched. In the package they found a Gobstopper candy box holding 368 Oxycontin pills (319 of them were 30-mg, 49 were 15-mg) and an alprazolam pill (Xanax). Kaczur then told them:
—He placed the order for pills "with his former Toledo Rockets football teammate, Rodney John Gamby."
—After he places orders, Gamby flies to Vegas, gets the pills and sends them to Kaczur in the mail.
—Kazcur pays $1 per milligram for the pill (which, according to the math, would be $10,305 for that intercepted package plus whatever the Xanax costs), and delivers the money himself to Gamby in Toledo or sends it in the mail.
—Gamby sent him three more packages, each with 325 Oxycodone pills, for which he hadn't yet paid Gamby (the postal inspector viewed surveillance video showing Gamby sending the packages at the Vegas post office).
December 13, 2012: Kaczur met with two inspectors at the U.S.P.S.'s inspection service field office in Cleveland and agreed to have two conversations with Gamby recorded. In the first call, he told his former teammate he would send the money for the pills in overnight mail. In the second, he told Gamby that he had put $10,000 in the mail for the package. Gamby said "$10,000 was not enough to pay what he owes 'Blake' or 'Jeff.'"
December 14, 2012: The postal inspector went undercover and delivered the money Kaczur "sent" to Gamby in Toledo. "Blake" answered and Gamby signed for it.
January 3, 2013: Kaczur called the postal inspector to tell him Gamby was going to Las Vegas to send him some pills.
January 8, 2013: The postal inspector intercepted a package sent by Gamby in Vegas to Kaczur in Chagrin Falls.
January 14, 2013: Kaczur went to the inspector's Cleveland field office and consented to have the package searched. In there were 451 Oxycodones (362 30-mg pills, 89 15-mg pills) and 54 adderalls (30-mg pills).
January 28, 2013: The postal inspector intercepted another package, but this time it was sent from Vegas to Gamby's Toledo apartment.
January 29, 2013: The inspector got a search warrant and found 275 oxycodone (30-mg) pills in a pill bottle. The pill bottle's label said it was prescribed to Gamby by a Dr. Vince Bruce — described by Las Vegas Weekly as an internal medicine and pediatrics specialist who "treats many patients for pain management" — but there were too many pills to be legitimate (it didn't say who created the illegitimate prescription).
The affidavit was filed on August 28, the day after it says Gamby left for Las Vegas and three days before he was to return to Toledo; "your affiant believes Rodney John Gamby will be in possession of illegally obtained oxycodone based on the aforementioned events described above."
Today, in the United States District Court in Cleveland, Gamby was indicted and the case was unsealed. On Gamby's facebook account, he has a picture he took of "Blake" (mentioned in the affidavit) at the Las Vegas airport:
More info: Nick Kaczur's stats as a player for the New England Patriots. His page on the Patriots website. The Boston Globe Story on his cooperation against his Oxycontin supplier in 2008. A Toledo Blade story about Gamby getting kicked off the football team for selling Oxycontin in 2005.
Here's a copy of the affidavit and indictment:
