COLUMBUS, OH – David Price, 56, of Columbus, will spend the rest of his life behind bars. A U.S. District Court judge today handed down a life sentence plus a consecutive 65 years to Price for his central role in a brutal narcotics ring and a horrific sex trafficking operation. The sentence comes after a jury found Price guilty on all counts in January and February, following a damning trial that laid bare the depths of his depravity.
Price, known on the streets as “DP,” wasn’t just moving weight. He was dealing in death. Court documents and trial testimony revealed that Price purposefully provided a lethal mix of narcotics to an adult female in July 2021, knowing it would cause a fatal overdose. The reason? She was talking to the police about his drug trafficking enterprise. This wasn’t a tragic accident; it was calculated murder, coldly executed to silence a potential witness.
The scope of Price’s criminal activity was staggering. The organization, active from January 2008 until its dismantling in 2022, distributed massive quantities of fentanyl, cocaine, crack cocaine, methamphetamine, heroin, marijuana, Xanax, and Oxycodone. The operation centered around residences on Burgess and Harris avenues, brazenly operating within 1,000 feet of Burroughs Elementary School. The government seized over $1.7 million, 50 firearms, and nine vehicles – including a motorcycle – as part of the investigation, which initially indicted 11 defendants in July 2022 and expanded with a superseding indictment in October 2022.
But the drugs were only half of Price’s monstrous business. He also ran a systematic sex trafficking operation, preying on vulnerable women struggling with addiction. From 2016 to 2022, Price and his co-conspirators forced and coerced adult female drug addicts into performing commercial sex acts, leveraging their dependence on controlled substances. Women were lured to a residence associated with Price, given a “front” of drugs to stave off withdrawal, then pushed into prostitution on Sullivant Avenue to pay off their “debt” – a vicious cycle of exploitation.
The details of the sex trafficking were especially harrowing. Trial testimony revealed Price routinely locked victims inside his residence for days or weeks, refusing to let them leave unless they complied with his demands. One woman was confined to a dog cage, then shot and stabbed by Price. Another was restrained. A third was brutally beaten and choked, left with a black eye. He withheld drugs, forcing women into agonizing withdrawal if they refused to engage in sex acts. Price was found guilty of three separate counts of sex trafficking related to these acts of violence and coercion.
Acting U.S. Attorney Kelly A. Norris praised the collaborative investigation led by Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost’s Ohio Organized Crime Investigations Commission task force, including the Columbus Division of Police, Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) Detroit, and the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA). This case serves as a grim reminder of the interconnectedness of drug trafficking and human exploitation, and the lengths to which criminals will go to maintain control. The 25-defendant case highlights a serious, sustained criminal presence in central Ohio, finally brought to a reckoning.
RELATED: ‘DP’ Price Gets Life for Drugs, Murder & Sex Trafficking
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Key Facts
- State: Ohio
- Agency: DOJ USAO
- Category: Drug Trafficking|Violent Crime|Sex Crimes|Organized Crime
- Source: Official Source ↗
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