Erie County District Attorney John J. Flynn announces that State Supreme Court Justice Christopher J. Burns has sentenced 30-year-old Miguel Parilla, also known as “Snow,” of Buffalo to a determinate 9 years in prison followed by 3 years of post-release supervision. The defendant was sentenced as a second felony offender.

On March 20, 2017, Erie County Sheriff’s Office detectives located more than one-half ounce of fentanyl, approximately 100 Xanax pills, more than one-eighth ounce of crack cocaine and marijuana inside a Grand Island home as a result of their investigation into a drug overdose death that occurred at that same location. Investigators also found materials used to cut and package narcotics, including a scale with suspected drug residue.

On March 22, 2017, as a result of the same investigation, Erie County Sheriff’s detectives apprehended the defendant and charged him with the possession of the narcotics found in the Grand Island home. The investigation revealed that the defendant had been operating a drug trafficking operation out of the home by distributing the drugs recovered by investigators in exchange for money. 

Justice Burns found Parilla guilty on two counts of Criminal Possession of a Controlled Substance in the Third Degree, one count of Criminal Possession of a Controlled Substance in the Fourth Degree and Criminal Possession of a Controlled Substance in the Fifth Degree following a nearly two week bench trial in September 2018. 

In a separate case, Parilla was convicted by a jury on one count of Criminal Possession of a Controlled Substance in the Third Degree and one count of Criminal Possession of a Controlled Substance in the Seventh Degree in March 2018.

The charges stem from an incident on January 24, 2017, when Buffalo Police officers initiated a traffic stop on Hertel Avenue and River Rock Drive. Officers found a small amount of cocaine and heroin, packaged for sale, inside the glove box of the vehicle. The packages of narcotics were tested for DNA, which matched the defendant who was a passenger in the vehicle.

On June 22, 2018, he was sentenced by State Supreme Court Justice M. William Boller to a determinate 10 years sentence. The sentence that the defendant received today will be served consecutively to the sentence he received from Justice Boller.

DA Flynn commends the investigative work by the Erie County Sheriff’s Office Detective Bureau and Narcotics Unit, including Det. Brian O’Hara.

The case was prosecuted by Assistant District Attorney Ryan D. Haggerty of the DA’s Tactical Prosecution Unit and Assistant District Attorney Meghan E. Leydecker of the DA’s Special Victims Bureau.