Independence man, wife get probation in cigarette case

Two Independence residents have been sentenced to probation for their role in a multimillion-dollar contraband cigarette network.

Craig Sheffler, 45, was ordered to serve six months in a halfway house as part of five years of probabtion. Nicole Sheffler, his wife, was given three years of probation. Both had previously pleaded guilty to charges in the case, and both were sentenced Thursday by U.S. District Judge Brian C. Wimes in Kansas City.

In August 2013, 17 people in eight states and Canada were indicted after a Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms undercover operation in Kansas City. Most of the cigarettes passed through the Cheap Tobacco Wholesale warehouse in Independence, owned by Craig Sheffler, on their way to New York.

The illegal operation involved hundreds of thousands of cartons of cigarettes, valued at millions of dollars. The cigarettes were sold, without payment of New York’s $4.35-a-pack excise tax, at Indian reservation smoke shops and elsewhere. New York state’s loss in taxes alone exceeded $8 million, authorities say.

Last December, Craig Sheffler pleaded guilty to contraband cigarette trafficking and participating in a conspiracy to commit wire fraud. Nicole Sheffler admitted collecting checks from customers of Cheap Tobacco Wholesale and delivering money to what turned out to be the ATF undercover warehouse in Kansas City to buy more cigarettes.

So far, one defendant in the case has been sentenced to prison. Robert Dean Bell, of Blanchard, Oklahoma, pleaded guilty a year ago to federal charges of possessing and transporting contraband cigarettes. He admitted transporting 17,400 cartons of untaxed cigarettes, costing the state of Oklahoma $275,163 in excise taxes. He was sentenced to 18 months in prison.

Other sentencings are yet to come.

In addition to the Shefflers and Bell, sentencings have included:

• Gholamreza “Reza” Tadaiyon, 51, of Weston, Florida, five years of probation and ordered to forfeit $1.05 million, the amount the government says Tadaiyon made in the scheme.

• Keith Donald Stoldt, 62, of Cowlesville, New York, five years of probation and ordered to forfeit $247,080 to the government. He and his wife ran a smoke shop on the Tonawanda Seneca Indian Reservation in New York.

• Jan’s Smoke Shop on the Tonawanda Reservation paid $3.55 million fines, judgments and restitution.

• A.J.’s Wholesale LLC of Irving, N.Y., was fined $1 million and ordered to forfeit the proceeds of the offense – $221,550 – and pay restitution to the state of New York.

At the time of the arrests two years ago, federal authorities said they had seized money and property, including $399,206.22 from a bank account in the name of Cheap Tobacco Wholesale; a 2009 Cessna airplane sold at auction for $450,000, and four 2012 Peterbilt trucks sold for more than $100,000 each.