MONTPELIER, Vt. (AP) – A Canadian citizen living in Wales, Maine, has been convicted a second time of trying to smuggle 3-pounds of marijuana into the United States almost two years ago.

On Friday, Real Gagnon, 57, was convicted in U.S. District Court in Brattleboro after a two-day trial.

Last year, he was convicted of similar charges in Vermont District Court in Guildhall, but a judge ordered a new trial because Essex County State’s Attorney Vincent Illuzzi made an improper comment during his closing argument, Illuzzi said on Monday.

Following last year’s conviction, Illuzzi said if the federal government wants the state to prosecute border cases, then the feds should help out.

Illuzzi said after the judge ordered a new trial that he was unwilling to try Gagnon a second time and the case was turned over to federal prosecutors.

Gagnon was arrested by Vermont State Police in December 2004 as he tried to enter the United States at the tiny border crossing Beecher Falls with the marijuana in the trunk of his 1995 Cadillac Deville.

Gagnon faces a maximum of five years in prison and, because he is a Canadian citizen, deportation that will bar him for life from returning to the United States. He is free on conditions pending sentencing, said Assistant United States Attorney Barbara Masterson.

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