NJ Man Sentenced In Bucks County For Gun Charge: Bucks DA's Office

A man awaiting trial in New Jersey on heroin trafficking charges was sentenced today in Bucks County Common Pleas Court to serve two to five years in state prison for a related gun offense, according to the Bucks County District Attorney's Office.

Ricardo Moise, 27, of Ewing, N.J., pleaded guilty to charges that he possessed a firearm illegally because of his extensive criminal record, the DA's office said.

Prosecutor Deputy District Attorney Thomas Gannon, said that Moise’s record includes three felony convictions in New Jersey for drug-dealing and gun offenses, making it illegal for Moise to possess a gun in Pennsylvania, the DA's office said.

Moise was arrested in Trenton on June 2 by members of the Special Investigations Unit of the Mercer County N.J. Prosecutor’s Office, according to the DA's office. He faces charges alleging that a car he was driving contained two guns and a large amount of heroin and cash, the DA's office said.

Middletown Township Police and Bucks County Detectives later searched a Middletown apartment where Moise had been living at the time of his arrest, leading investigators to find numerous documents in Moise’s name related to the vehicle in which the heroin allegedly was found, as well as a loaded, 9mm Beretta semiautomatic pistol, the DA's office said.

The DA's office said the gun had been reported stolen in North Myrtle Beach, S.C. As part of a plea agreement, a charge of receiving stolen property was dropped, and Moise was sentenced to five years of concurrent probation on the firearms charge, according to the DA's office.

Bucks County Judge Diane E. Gibbons accepted the plea agreement, but rejected Moise’s request that his sentence be delayed for two weeks to enable him to get his affairs in order, the DA's office said. Gibbons said Moise's criminal history, the length of his sentence, and the public’s need for protection demanded that he be imprisoned immediately, the DA's office said

Moise is scheduled for trial Dec. 23 in Trenton on the New Jersey charges, according to the DA's office.

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