An Erie man identified as a drug courier for the Pagans in Western Pennsylvania pleaded guilty Wednesday to federal drug charges after agents intercepted him on tapped cellphones and Facebook Messenger talking to the alleged leader of the Pittsburgh chapter of the biker gang.
Mark Stockhausen, 40, pleaded in Erie federal court to a count of conspiracy to distribute cocaine.
Stockhausen had been indicted in December along with 29 other reputed Pagans and their associates in Western Pennsylvania and eastern Ohio on charges of drug dealing and illegal gun possession.
The multiagency investigation, headed by the Pittsburgh FBI, began in 2018 and led to wiretaps on 10 phones from August 2020 through November 2020 that revealed the gang was distributing cocaine, methamphetamine and heroin, prosecutors said.
Among the main targets was Bill Rana, reputed sergeant-at-arms for the Pittsburgh chapter of the Pagans.
Stockhausen was intercepted on Mr. Rana’s phone and also communicated with him on Facebook, according to his plea. The investigation revealed that Stockhausen was a courier for Rana’s operation, obtaining cocaine from a co-defendant in Detroit, Hasani James, and returning to Pennsylvania with the drugs for distribution by others in the gang.
At the plea hearing, Stockhausen accepted responsibility for the distribution of 252 grams of cocaine.
U.S. District Judge Robert Colville will sentence him in September.
Judge Colville scheduled the sentencing for 9 a.m. Sept. 29.
