By Linda Trischitta, Sun Sentinel
FORT LAUDERDALE —
A former West Palm Beach police officer was sentenced
to five years in federal prison Friday for knowingly carrying his gun while
committing a drug-trafficking crime.
Dewitt McDonald, 46, of Wellington, pleaded guilty to
the charge in April, which came after an FBI investigation found he was
illegally selling steroids, according to court documents.
McDonald, who was a police officer for two decades,
was overcome with emotion in a Fort Lauderdale courtroom as he told U.S.
District Judge James I. Cohn that he "accepted full responsibility"
for his "conduct and bad choices."
Lawyer Michael Salnick read the rest of McDonald's
statement. It described the difficulty of being the defendant when McDonald had
previously been a witness for the government, and apologized for his actions
when his job had once been to uphold the law.
Steven Detter, McDonald's former West Palm Beach
police colleague and supervisor, cried and told Cohn his heart was broken. He
called McDonald his "best friend," "a cop's cop" who had
been a field training officer and honor guard who loved his job.
From September 2011 through April 2013 and while still
a cop, prosecutors said McDonald operated Prime Performance Wellness Centers in
Lake Worth and Prime Health and Rejuvenation Clinic in Wellington.
McDonald illegally obtained testosterone and other
controlled substances with forged or altered prescriptions and sold the drugs
to customers, including officers in the West Palm Beach police department,
according to a statement of facts that he signed.
"This is a good guy who did something bad, and
he's paying for it," Salnick, a longtime friend of McDonald's, told the
court. The men have raised their sons together.
Salnick later said about the charge, "He didn't
have his gun out, selling drugs. The gun was part of his professional
attire."
He said Friday was "one of the hardest days I've
had as a criminal defense lawyer, because I know how he feels about family and
children. He's losing his liberty and may lose his pension."
Cohn will allow McDonald to turn himself in to prison
on Sept. 18.
"It's always unfortunate when a law enforcement
officer violates the law, especially one with a sterling record who has a fine
family and who had everything going for him," Cohn said.
In addition to the statute-mandated, 60-month
sentence, McDonald must serve three years of supervised release and pay
restitution of $25,810.
The judge could have ordered a life sentence for
McDonald, as well as a $250,000 fine that the court waived after finding he
could not afford to pay it.
Cohn said he would recommend to the U.S. Bureau of
Prisons that McDonald serve time in a South Florida facility to be near his
wife Carla and their three children.
"Good people make bad choices," Carla
McDonald told the judge about the man she has known 12 years and called the
backbone of their family. "That doesn't change how we love him."
