Jerome "Righteous" Roberts was arrested in the summer of 2013 on multiple heroin dealing charges.
TRENTON -- A state appeals court has upheld the case of a Trenton man who pleaded guilty to dealing heroin in a school zone in the city three years ago.
Jerome "Righteous" Roberts was arrested in the summer of 2013 on three heroin dealing charges when a Mercer County Prosecutor's Office drug task force searched his Division Street home with a warrant.
Jerome RobertsOfficers found $28,500 worth of heroin. The appeals decision says detectives watched him make a sale to a confidential informant.
Roberts accepted a plea deal in early 2015 on the school zone charge for a seven-year prison term, with three and a half years without parole.
On appeal, Roberts argued that the affidavit that led to the search warrant lacked information to create probable cause that drugs would be found in his home.
And he argued was that prosecutors failed to properly notify him that his sentence would be an extended one, due to his prior criminal convictions, and his sentence term should now be reduced.
The appeals panel was not swayed on either argument, writing Thursday that Roberts was well aware of what he was agreeing to when he took the plea.
Roberts, once labeled a Bloods gang leader in Trenton, has criminal convictions from two, high-profile cases in Mercer County.
In 2007, Roberts pleaded guilty to aggravated manslaughter and was sentenced to 10 years in prison for his role in the 2001 murder of rival drug dealer Robert Priester.
He admitted to conspiring to hire two Monmouth County men to shoot Priester, who was sitting in a parked car in Ewing.
While free on bail on murder charges, Roberts was arrested in the summer of 2005 in ''Operation Capital City," a state racketeering investigation of drug dealing in the Trenton area by street gangs. That case netted him a four-year prison term.
Roberts, now 45, is currently in a state prison halfway house in Camden and is eligible for parole in January 2017.
Kevin Shea may be reached at kshea@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter@kevintshea. Find NJ.com on Facebook.