Arvada Man Sent To Federal Prison For Mailing Pot

DENVER, CO -- An Arvada man was sentenced to federal prison for illegal possession of marijuana and sending it through the U.S. Mail. Mark Herbert Koenig, 36, of Arvada pleaded guilty in October, 2017 to to possession of a federal controlled substance with intent to distribute. Prosecutors said he mailed four packages containing illegal marijuana between October 2015 and January of 2016, according to a statement from U.S. Attorney Bob Troyer's office. Koenig was sentenced by Judge R. Brooke Jackson on Jan. 25.

Drug sniffing dogs at the U.S. Postal Service alerted local postal inspectors to the pot-filled packets, and after warrants were obtained, packages were opened, according to the U.S. Attorney. They were found to contain between 950 grams to 1.6 kilograms of marijuana. On Jan. 13, 2016, investigators with a search warrant raided Koenig's Arvada house. A working group of the Arvada Police, West Metro Drug Task Force and the U.S. Postal Inspection Service investigated the case. Inside the Arvada home, postal inspectors found 123 mature marijuana plants in an illegal grow, which translated to 18,672 grams for prosecutorial purposes.

“U.S. Postal Inspectors continue to aggressively target individuals who use the postal service to distribute controlled substances,” said Dana Carter, inspector in charge of the U.S. Postal Inspection Service, Denver division in a statement. “Our efforts to protect the nation’s mail, and postal customers, from illegal drug shipments are highlighted in cases such as these, where repeat offenders are sent to federal prison.”

Koenig was described as a former finance professional turned weed-industry consultant in a 2013 article in the UK Independent.

In February of 2017, another Arvada resident, Stephen Paul Anderson, 27, was sentenced to a federal prisonterm for mailing marijuana, the DOJ reported.

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