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Ex-Police Officer From Westchester Sentenced For Selling Date Rape Drug

A former police officer from Sleepy Hollow was sentenced Friday for illegally selling a '"date rape" drug via the Internet, according to U.S. Attorney for the Southern District Preet Bharara.

Robert Smutek

Robert Smutek

Photo Credit: File photo

Robert Smutek was sentenced to eight years in prison by Judge Kenneth Karas after a federal jury in White Plains had earlier found the 53-year-old guilty on four counts in connection to the $1.2 million he made selling an illegal version of the date-rape drug GHB on his website called Online Coral Calcium which sold patent medicines.

"The sentence imposed on him by the court properly reflects the callous nature of his years-long drug dealing," Bharara said.

Smutek sold Potion 9, which was packaged in a one-ounce plastic bottle containing a pink liquid, between 2009 and 2014, advertising it on his website as a “mood enhancer” that supposedly made the user feel euphoric, Bharara. 

According to the label, Potion 9 contained yohimbe, a derivation of a tree root found in South Africa, as well as other natural ingredients. But according to the evidence at trial, Potion 9 actually contained 1,4 butanediol, an industrial solvent that converted to GHB in the body when ingested, according to Bharara. At sentencing, Smutek was held responsible for distributing 200,000 bottles of Potion 9 over five years and ordered to forfeit the $1.2 million in proceeds from the scheme.

Smutek, who resides in Sleepy Hollow and was a former drug task force member as a police officer, was also sentenced to three years of supervised release. 

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