CHICAGO – The man who prosecutors say carried 62 pounds of suspected cocaine worth $3.5 million in his luggage at Midway International Airport has been sentenced to seven years in prison.
Terrence Slaughter, 56, was arrested on October 24, 2023 in Midway. Coincidentally, that day was the 16th anniversary of a federal judge sentencing him to 15.67 years for stealing guns from a retired police officer and deliberately selling them to gang members. records.
Chicago police officers who arrested Slaughter at Midway said he gave investigators permission to search his two rolling bags. Police found 12 vacuum-sealed bags of suspected cocaine in one bag and 11 sealed bags of suspected cocaine in the other, prosecutors said in court filings. In total, investigators found 62 pounds of suspected cocaine with a street value of $3,518,125, prosecutors alleged.
Slaughter resolved the case by pleading guilty to manufacturing and delivering 15 to 100 grams of cocaine, court records show. Judge Carol Howard gave him the seven-year term. He is expected to be released on parole on January 5, 2028.
On October 24, 2007, a federal judge in Chicago sentenced Slaughter to 188 months in prison for a case that began in May 2003 after police saw him carrying two guns from the home of a retired Illinois State Police sergeant in suburban North Riverside . The police reportedly found eight more weapons in his car.
Slaughter “admitted to stealing a total of 33 to 38 guns from the police sergeant’s home and selling some of the firearms to known gang members,” an appeals court later wrote, saying he pleaded guilty to two federal weapons charges without reaching a plea deal.
His state crime convictions include narcotics convictions in 2002 and 1991 and two theft-related cases in 1997.
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