Convicted drug dealer faces federal gun charges for incidents at Everett casino and in Roxbury

A Roxbury man convicted for his role in a Boston-area coke ring - and who has a criminal record dating to his teens - was charged in federal court this week as a felon in possession of a firearm.

If convicted, Tarik Muhummad, 29, faces up to ten years in federal prison.

Muhummad's federal charge stems from his arrest in Roxbury this past February on a gun charge and the two-year sentence he received for his participation in his cousin Kenji Drayton's drug ring, because federal law makes it a crime for anybody sentenced to a year or more in jail or prison to possess a firearm.

After pleading guilty to coke charges, Muhummad was sentenced to two years in federal prison on June 21, 2022 - and then immediately released because he had spent two years behind bars awaiting trial in the case. He was also sentenced to three years of "supervised release" - the federal equivalent of parole.

On Feb. 4 of this year, Muhummad was denied entry to the Encore Boston casino in Everett after guards realized he was packing a gun, according to an affidavit by an FBI agent on the case. A regional police center issued an officer-safety alert for Muhummad and the SUV with a vanity plate spotted driving away. Around 4:50 a.m. on Feb. 5, Boston Police officers responded to a shots-fired call on Dale Street in Roxbury and obtained surveillance video showing that SUV in the area at the time of the shots.

On Feb. 6, the affidavit continues, officers spotted the SUV in the area behind Roxbury Community College.

Based on that information, the officers attempted to conduct a traffic stop. The driver, later determined to be MUHAMMAD, failed to stop and led the police on a chase. MUHAMMAD drove into another car, got out of the Rav 4 and took off running. Ultimately, police caught MUHAMMAD, arrested him and searched him. During that search, the police found a Taurus, 9mm pistol, bearing serial number TAR19485, in MUHAMMAD'S waist-band.

Muhummad did not go easily when he was arrested on coke charges in 2020, either, according to an earlier FBI affidavit, which recounts what District B-2 officers found after they had transported him to their station for booking:

As investigators opened the wagon door, they saw MUHAMMAD attempting to ingest a white substance (that they believed to be cocaine) on the wagon’s floor. MUHAMMAD also was covered in white powder with a dazed look upon his face. As he was removed from the wagon and placed on the ground, MUHAMMAD began spitting out a white-colored substance that appeared to be cocaine, based on the officers’ training and experience. Officers recovered that same white-colored powdered substance from MUHAMMAD’s outer clothing and from the floor of the BPD patrol wagon. Additionally, while at the Area B-2 Boston Police station, law enforcement officers recovered a clear, ripped, plastic bag with white residue from MUHAMMAD’s underwear.

In February, 2021, a federal magistrate judge rejected Muhammad's request to be released from pre-trial lockup to home arrest in part because of the alleged weakness of the government's case against him, in part because he has asthma and was worried about contracting Covid-19. In her ruling, the magistrate judge noted that Muhammad had refused Covid-19 vaccination and that, in any case, his long record meant he remained too great a potential threat to society.

Innocent, etc.