Notoriously Dirty Drug Cop Admits To Illegal Gun Sales

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Josh Farley/Kitsap Sun
Portrait of the Asshole as an Old Man: Drug cop Roy Alloway terrorized Washington medical marijuana patients for years. Now he’s pleaded guilty to federal charges of illegal gun sales, and could go to prison for up to five years.

Every now and then, karma gets it right.

A former police narcotics officer indicted after a federal investigation into illegal gun dealing at Western Washington gun shows pleaded guilty on Wednesday. He faces up to five years in prison, and is scheduled for sentencing on January 20.

Roy Alloway, a 56-year-old retired cop from Port Orchard, was indicted in May by a federal grand jury in Seattle along with three other men, reports Levi Pulkkinen at the Seattle P.I. Alloway was the biggest alleged gun dealer indicted, but the same sting also targeted another man purported to have sold a gun which was used to kill a Seattle police officer.
Alloway, a longtime Bremerton undercover narcotics detective, was infamous for his boorish behavior on the job with the Bremerton Police Department — especially when dealing with medical marijuana patients, with whom he had a deservedly horrible reputation. He pleaded guilty to illegally operating as a gun dealer and to income tax fraud.
The officer was so despised among Washington’s medical marijuana patients that a strain of medical marijuana was ironically named after him in retaliation for his being a raging asshole.
His 10 years with the West Sound Narcotics Enforcement Team (WestNET) made him a well-known officer around the state, particularly for his work in marijuana eradication, reports the Kitsap Sun, Alloway’s hometown newspaper.

Alloway took something of an unhealthy personal interest in giving additional pain to medical marijuana patients, according to many activists in the area, who “see him as a cop determined to lock up even legal users of pot,” wrote Nina Shapiro at the Seattle Weekly.
He made a career of trashing houses and intimidating their often very ill occupants, apparently not giving a damn if the people he harassed for marijuana were legitimate patients or not.

John Keatley/Seattle Weekly
Steve Sarich of CannaCare with medical marijuana strain “Alloway,” named after crooked local drug cop Roy Alloway.

​”This guy is a real pice of shit, and has been for years,” Steve Sarich of CannaCare told Toke of the Town when he was indicted back in May. “I can’t wait to see how many of the cases Alloway was involved with are overturned, if he gets locked away on these charges.”
That’s exactly why a potent marijuana strain was named “Alloway” in his “honor.” Created by a well-known Everett breeder associated with advocate Steve Sarich of CannaCare, the Alloway strain includes the genetics of popular Seattle strain PermaFrost, with a little White Widow reputedly in the mix as well.
For just one example of how Alloway rolled, there was the infamous May 2010 raid by Alloway and other SWATted out WestNET goons of an Olalla, Washington home linked to a Tacoma medical marijuana dispensary known as North End Club 420.
According to a mom who lived at the house, these bush-league Rambos handcuffed her 14-year-old son, took money kept in the Mickey Mouse purse of her nine-year-old daughter, and seemed to take an unsavory pleasure in loudly announcing that their dad was “going to jail” because he was a “drug dealer.”
As if that weren’t bad enough, IQ-challenged WestNET agents illegally seized signed petitions for marijuana legalization from the home. (They were later forced to return the petitions.)
Sold Guns To Undercover ATF Agents
Alloway was busily violating the law for years, even as he harassed patients who weren’t.
Prosecutors claimed Alloway bought 387 guns between January 2005 and late 2010. The dumb-ass sold pistols to undercover ATF agents on at least three occasions without being licensed.
According to the affidavit, ATF agents began investigating Alloway in July 2009, after he was contacted by an undercover agent at a Centralia gun show.
“There was never any paperwork ever filled out during any of ATF’s undercover purchases for firearms from Alloway,” a federal agent told the court. “Alloway has easier access to guns through the (federal firearms license) which has helped him funnel firearms from the shop to his ‘private sale’ booth at a greater pace,” the ATF agent said. “Alloway is using the FFL to his advantage … because of the price margin.”
Federal prosecutors also said Alloway underreported his income to the IRS. They asked that Alloway be forced to forfeit the guns seized from his home last November, along with any proceeds from the illegal sales.
His South Kitsap home was raided by federal agents in November 2010 (god, where’s some video footage when you need it; this shit would be absolutely fucking priceless) as part of a roundup of several suspects accused of illegal gun sales around Western Washington.
On November 18, ATF agents seized 58 guns from his Port Orchard home, according to court documents, also seizing a booklet detailing how to convert a semiautomatic AK-47 rifle into a fully automatic machine gun.
“As a police officer, Roy Alloway knew better than anyone else the risks of distributing firearms without background checks or sales records,” said U.S. Attorney Jenny A. Durkan. “His attempt to hide the income from his illegal activity demonstrates he knew what he was doing was wrong.”
“Gun shows are legal, but funneling illegal gun sales through gun shows is not,” Durkan said earlier this year. “Illegal gun sales allow guns to get in the wrong hands and blocks our ability to trace guns used in violent crimes. These defendants knew better, but put their profit ahead of the safety of the community.”
Alloway retired in May 2010 after 32 years of wreaking havoc as a one of those smart-ass piece-of-shit cops that give the rest of them a bad name. Even the mainstream Seattle P.I. called his career “lengthy and somewhat controversial.”
Between 2007 and 2010, he deposited cash, checks and money orders in his bank account totaling $192,000 — but the damn crook didn’t declare any of that income on his tax returns.
As part of his plea agreement, Alloway promised to pay all back taxes and forfeit 58 guns to the government that were taken in the raid on his house last November.
The case was investigated by agents with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF).
“I’m surprised at the outcome,” Bremerton Mayor Patty Lent said of Alloway’s guilty plea. The mayor said Alloway’s benefits are administered by the state and federal governments, so she “couldn’t say” how those might be affected.
Lent said Bremerton itself shouldn’t be affected by the case. “He’s retired,” the mayor said. “It was a case brought by the federal government. It doesn’t really have anything to do with the city.”
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