Local and federal law enforcement agents gather in February 2018 at the home of Brian J. Bilodeau at 72 Danville Corner Road in Auburn. Authorities seized several luxury cars, including a blue Lamborghini Huracan valued at $190,000. On Wednesday, he was sentenced to more than four years in prison for drug trafficking. Andree Kehn/Sun Journal file
PORTLAND — A mystified federal judge sentenced an Auburn man Wednesday to more than four years in prison for drug trafficking from which he amassed vast wealth.
U.S. District Court Judge George Z. Singal told 38-year-old Brian Bilodeau that he couldn’t understand why someone who had everything going for him, including support from his family and friends, a college education and a promising sports career, would engage in a criminal enterprise.
“Greed” was the only conclusion the judge could draw, he said, adding a $50,000 fine to Bilodeau’s sentence of 50 months in federal prison.
“I’m still trying to come to grips with Mr. Bilodeau’s motives other than greed,” Singal said. “I don’t understand it, apart from greed.”
Bilodeau was ordered to report to a federal prison in Pensacola, Florida, in one month.
Federal agents fanned out across Androscoggin County on Feb. 27, 2018, executing more than 20 search warrants. Agents searched a warehouse in Auburn used to cultivate marijuana where they seized about 321 marijuana plants and 181 pounds of marijuana that was cultivated by Bilodeau and others, according to court documents.
Singal said most of the defendants he sentences on drug trafficking charges come from underprivileged backgrounds, extreme poverty, abusive and dysfunctional families and are addicted to the drugs they sell.
Bilodeau breaks that mold, he said.
Roughly a dozen of Bilodeau’s family and friends appeared in the courtroom, showing their support.
His parents addressed the judge, painting a picture of their son as energetic, witty, kind, and “just a great person.”
Bilodeau, who has been free on bail since his 2018 arrest, said Wednesday that his supervised release has for the past five years felt like he’s “been in jail.”
He told the judge he was “deeply sorry” for his conduct and the toll it has taken on his friends and family.
Bilodeau said he understands the “mistakes” and “poor decisions” he’s made.
“I can’t change the past but I can certainly learn from it,” he said.
“I’ve always been a happy and positive person,” he said.
He began growing marijuana under the state’s medical marijuana program as a licensed supplier, but soon “got carried away with what I was doing,” he said.
Assistant U.S. Attorney David Joyce outlined the vastness of the black market scheme Bilodeau headed up along with a few others from the Lewiston and Auburn area, noting that from 2015 to 2018, the conspirators raked in $9.4 million from sales of the drug and derivatives.
Judge Singal said he recalled an expert witness had testified at an earlier court hearing that a medical marijuana provider at the upper end of Maine’s program would expect to earn between $40,000 and $45,000 per year.
In the basement of Bilodeau’s modest Auburn home was a “saferoom” built into the foundation, equipped with a vault door. Inside the room was a safe. Agents recovered a ledger, a money counter, 180 pounds of marijuana, thousands of dollars in cash and a handgun. Another handgun was found on his bedside table. He also possessed two Rolex watches.
Parked in his garage was a collection of exotic cars, Joyce said, including a 2016 Lamborghini Huracan and a 2014 Nissan GT-R.
Joyce, who said he believed Bilodeau’s possessions to be had urged the judge to impose a sentence of 60 months in prison and a “substantial” fine.
Bilodeau’s attorney, Timothy Zerillo, was seeking a 31-month sentence, the minimum allowed by an October plea agreement reached by prosecutors and the defense.
Bilodeau’s co-conspirators received prison sentences ranging from 41 to 72 months in prison.
He pleaded guilty to manufacturing 50 or more marijuana plants and possession with intent to distribute more than 50 kilograms of marijuana.
Bilodeau waived his rights to appeal his conviction and sentence.
Although Bilodeau had paid $50,000 in income tax on profits from the conspiracy, Joyce said that had been an attempt to lend legitimacy to an illegal enterprise.
Zerillo said his client entrepreneurial spirit had backfired on him as he got in deeper in the conspiracy.
Making money “can be as much of a drug as something you can inject,” he said.
Bilodeau told the judge that when he sets his mind on doing something, he goes “all in.”
He had no criminal history except for operating after suspension when he was in his early 20s, Zerillo.
Bilodeau recently earned a real estate license while free on bail and was hired by a commercial real estate brokerage company.
He owns a real estate rental property that houses his mother, who still suffers from injuries sustained in a car crash when Bilodeau was 12 years old.
He and his brother visit with her and their father every week, he said.
A competitive golfer, Bilodeau won the inaugural Maine amateur golf championship at the Maine Event tournament in Waterville in 2020.
More than a dozen people and businesses involved in laundering drug proceeds were charged in connection with the illegal marijuana trafficking organization, federal officials said. With Bilodeau’s sentencing Wednesday, all of the defendants connected to the case have been convicted and sentenced.
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