Faces At Least 20 Years in Prison

Nov. 13, 2019 ~ Press Release

An Oak Grove, Missouri, man pleaded guilty in federal court today to distributing the heroin that resulted in the overdose death of an Arizona man visiting his family in Lee’s Summit, Missouri.

Joshua Austin Leroux, 35, waived his right to a grand jury and pleaded guilty before U.S. Chief District Judge Beth Phillips to an information that charges him with one count of distributing heroin that caused the death of a man identified in court documents as “M.A.C.”

By pleading guilty today, Leroux admitted that he distributed heroin to M.A.C. on Sept. 3, 2017. After M.A.C. acquired the heroin from Leroux, he ingested it at some point on Sept. 3, or the morning of Sept. 4, 2017. The Jackson County Medical Examiner, after conducting an autopsy, declared that the cause of M.A.C.’s death was heroin intoxication.

Under federal statutes, Leroux is subject to a mandatory minimum sentence of 20 years in federal prison without parole, up to a sentence of life in federal prison without parole. The maximum statutory sentence is prescribed by Congress and is provided here for informational purposes, as the sentencing of the defendant will be determined by the court based on the advisory sentencing guidelines and other statutory factors. A sentencing hearing will be scheduled after the completion of a presentence investigation by the United States Probation Office.

This case is being prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney D. Michael Green. It was investigated by the Drug Enforcement Administration and the Jackson County Drug Task Force.