42-month prison time not enough, say relatives of slain women

Dean Smoronk (Va. State Police photo)

Relatives of two women killed at the home of a convicted Farmington drug dealer in 2017 scoffed at his light sentence this week for participating in a meth trafficking enterprise, but he could be out on the street well before he has served his 42-month sentence, according to a public information officer with the U.S. District Court of New Hampshire and legal websites that deal with federal sentencing guidelines.

Dean Smoronk, 58, formerly of 979 Meaderboro Road, has never been implicated in the killing of his longtime girlfriend, Christine Sullivan, 48; and an acquaintance of hers, Jenna Pellegrini, 32, of Barrington, but the drug enterprise run from his Farmington is a major factor in the two women's deaths in January 2017, said Michael Pellegrini, Jenna's dad; and Jeff Sullivan, Christine's brother, earlier this week.

Sullivan called the sentence "a slap on the wrist," while Pellegrini held Smoronk responsible for the murders even if he didn't kill them, himself.

"He should be in jail for life, he's got convictions throughout his entire life," said Pellegrini. "He's the reason for this; to give him 42 months is ridiculous."

He added while Smoronk may not have committed the murders, "he was involved in this whole fiasco."

"She was murdered because they let him out (of jail)," he said referring to an earlier drug arrests in South Carolina for which he was out on bail. "I mean they let him out, don't worry about him. This is the type of guy you see and you do something about, this is the type that they have to keep in jail."

"Over and over, they talk about second and third chances, not fifth and sixth times."

Smoronk has a history of drug arrests and conviction, including the arrest in South Carolina with his now-deceased girlfriend in 2014.

In that case Smoronk and Christina Marie Cuozzo (alias for Christine Sullivan), were stopped on I-95 after their car pulled into the lane of a Sumter County deputy and almost sideswiped the cruiser, according to police.

During that stop, a K-9 unit was called and suspected methamphetamine was found in Cuozzo's purse and a large quantity of suspected methamphetamine was found inside a fake energy drink along with a small amount of marijuana, pills and an unknown white powder inside a black computer bag, according to the report. Cuozzo was later identified by law enforcement officials as an alias for Sullivan, who was also selling drugs for Smoronk at the time of her death.

Smoronk was also arrested in Virginia in June 2017 - just five months after the murders - for drug possession after a traffic stop on Interstate 95 yielded a huge cache of drugs, according to police. The car was stopped while speeding through a work zone.

Charges filed included manufacturing and selling steroids, possession of needles, capsules and a pipe; four counts of possession of controlled substances and obstructing justice. He served a year in Pamunkey Regional Jail and was released in June 2018.

Earlier in life he was convicted for dealing LSD while a student at the University of Southern Illinois at Carbondale after a May 1982 arrest.

Smoronk was in Florida at the time of the killings, prosecutors said during the October trial of murder suspect Timothy Verrill of Dover. The trial ended in a mistrial due to discovery blunders by the New Hampshire State Police Major Crimes Unit. A second trial is not likely till next summer, lead prosecutor in the case Geoff Ward said on Wednesday.

Meanwhile, Smoronk, who was sentenced on Tuesday to 42 months for conducting a meth trafficking enterprise in connection with his arrest in Lebanon, Maine, last year, will get substantial pretrial credit for time already served and will qualify for good time credit as well.

Good time credit can amount to as much as 54 days per calendar year, according to nolo.com, a website that specializes in federal Bureau of Prisons policy.

Joe Cafarelli, an assistant public information officer with the U.S. District of New Hampshire prosecutor's office, said Smoronk will also be eligible for pretrial credit for time already served, but it's not a flat day for day credit like it is in Superior Court, but rather figured through a specific formula, of which he was unsure.

In addition, the last 10 percent of a federal prisoner's sentence - including any good time reductions - is spent at a halfway house, according to federaldefendersny.org.

Smoronk was arrested on Dec. 20, 2018. He agreed to a plea deal on Sept. 3.

The Rochester Voice reached out to U.S. Attorneys Seth R. Aframe and Jennifer C. Davis, who prosecuted the case, but both failed to return several phone calls.