PORTLAND — A Brooklyn man was sent to federal prison for six and a half years Thursday, a year after he was charged with dealing cocaine and heroin in the Lewiston area.

Corey Ray Howard, 35, was sentenced on four counts of aggravated drug trafficking and on charges of being a felon in possession of a firearm and violating conditions of release.

Police described Howard as a career criminal with a number of past convictions for violent crimes, including a 1996 armed robbery.

In 2013, local and federal police had been investigating Howard on suspicion that he was dealing crack and heroin out of a house on Beckett Street in Lewiston. The Maine Drug Enforcement Agency led the probe with the help of the Central Maine Violent Crimes Task Force and Lewiston and Auburn police.

Drug agents made undercover buys from Howard and were prepared to arrest him when he vanished from the area, police said.

The U.S. Marshals Service tracked Howard down near Hartford, Conn., police said. Last week, a pair of local MDEA agents went to Hartford for an extradition hearing. Howard did not fight extradition, police said, and was returned to Maine.

According to the indictment, police seized a Phoenix Arms .25-caliber pistol when Howard was arrested.

When he fled to Connecticut, police said, Howard was out on bail from previous drug charges. He additionally was charged with dealing cocaine within 1,000 feet of a Lewiston school and with dealing crack and heroin in Auburn during the same period.

Howard was sentenced in U.S. District Court in Portland.

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