16 years for drug importer

ANCHORAGE — Saying “the country is just doggone tired” of drug abuse and deaths related to it, federal judge Ralph Beistline on Thursday sentenced Robin Gattis to 16 years in prison.

Gattis, 20, had pleaded guilty to a drug conspiracy charge prior to Thursday’s hearing.

The drugs he imported from China — a synthetic drug often referred to with the street name “Molly,” which mimics the effects of ecstasy — were found to have caused the overdose death of Matt Scott, 20. Prosecutors say Gattis didn’t call for help, knowingly leaving his friend to die painfully in a room near his own. Gattis claimed in court that he didn’t know Scott was dying before he found him without a pulse and cold to the touch.

Molly is in the class of so-called designer drugs that includes things like bath salts and synthetic marijuana, and have bedeviled law enforcement efforts to outlaw them. A federal ban on the particular drug Gattis was importing went into effect during the time he was importing and selling it.

Beistline spent a good percentage of the hours-long hearing conversing directly with Gattis, at one point asking him what he thought Scott would say if he were in the courtroom that day.

“I think if he were here today he would want to see me be able to get out young and make something of myself. That’s just the kind of person he was,” Gattis told the judge.

He said he hadn’t had a lot of visitors in jail, but he believes that had Scott survived he would have visited.

“Matt was one of those people who would,” Gattis said.

“He would be there for you?” the judge asked.

“He was there for me. Many times,” Gattis replied.

Scott’s mother, Debbie Hurd, brought a framed photograph and a box of her son’s ashes to court.

“My son was a beautiful child and this is him now. He’s in a box,” she said.

She pointed out evidence that Gattis bought and sold the same drugs that killed her son even after he died.

“Who does that? Who does that? I can’t wrap my mind around it. Not someone with remorse, certainly not a friend,” she said.

Scott’s father, Dan Scott, said that he’d come up with lots of things to say to Gattis that day, but decided he only had one thing he wanted to say.

“You are the most worthless human being. You do not even deserve to be called a human being,” Dan Scott said. “All you had to do was call 911 and leave.”

He noted that Gattis had never contacted him or his family, nor had any of Gattis’ family members.

When Gattis’ father, Richard Gattis, got up to speak, Hurd pushed her son’s remains toward him and briefly blocked the way, talking to him with obvious emotion before her family calmed her and she took her seat.

“We agree that Robin has made a multitude of poor choices,” said Richard Gattis, a Federal Express pilot.

Robin Gattis was out on bail for assaulting his father when he was first arrested for drug crimes. Robin Gattis, during his testimony, said his dad had driven him to all his court dates in that case. Richard Gattis, whose voice broke repeatedly as he spoke, said the charge was blown out of proportion.

“With therapy and treatment he could become a productive member of our society,” Richard Gattis said.

Gattis’ mother, Lynn Gattis, a state House representative for an area near Wasilla, said that she believed her son’s case spoke to larger problems in society. Noting that the courtroom contained parents and children who had come to support Hurd and Scott, she said she had known many of those kids since they were in kindergarten.

“We have a bigger picture and we as mothers can do a lot more,” she said.

She said she was not trying to in any way excuse what her son had done.

“Everybody’s son is useful, important. I think Robin does have something he can offer, in time, with treatment,” Lynn Gattis said.

Robin Gattis told the judge he’d had a rough childhood, chafing under rules and regulations both from his parents and at school. He was a bright kid, everyone agreed, skipping eighth grade and graduating high school early, but his high school years included a few months in a residential treatment center for troubled kids. He’d been diagnosed as having oppositional defiant disorder.

As attorneys repeated the evidence presented in the case there were instances where they said Robin Gattis had refused his parents’ offers of help or sent them mean-spirited messages such as the one that said he was “waiting for you and dad’s tired asses to die so I can laugh on your graves.”

Beistline asked him about why he repeatedly refused their help and why he got so angry at them for even trying to help.

“It wasn’t for trying to help,” Robin Gattis replied. “I didn’t feel like they were trying to help.”

He said he thought a lot of what his mother was trying to do was to serve her own image and bolster her own reputation.

“Do you realize now how crazy that is? They’re here standing up for you in court trying to do what they can to help and you have made it impossible for them to do very much,” Beistline said.

The judge asked him why they would do that.

“They’re good people,” Robin Gattis replied. Then later adding, “they love me.”

Contact Andrew Wellner at 352-2270 or andrew.wellner@frontiersman.com.