Attorney Jeff Neppl sentenced in cocaine bust

A Rock Island attorney was sentenced Thursday in U.S. District Court, Rock Island, to nearly four years in federal prison for using his law office as a "stash house" for cocaine.

Judge Joe B. McDade sentenced Jeffrey J. Neppl, 41, of 1400 33rd St., Rock Island, to 46 months in prison on charges of conspiracy to distribute cocaine and possession with intent to distribute.

Dressed in a Mercer County Jail uniform, Mr. Neppl, a staunch man with slicked-back black hair, apologized for his actions and thanked his family for their support. "I see what I did and how wrong it was," he said.

Authorities say Mr. Neppl started dealing cocaine in early 2004, and in the summer of that year allegedly let another drug dealer, who was scared of being arrested, hide cocaine in a safe hidden in the ceiling of his law office.

"He betrayed the trust that was placed in him by the public as an attorney," assistant U.S. attorney John Mehochko said. "He turned his law office into a stash house."

Mr. Neppl also told the other dealer, who later became a police informant, that he could protect him with the attorney-client privilege, authorities say.

Judge McDade said that was the worst mistake Mr. Neppl made. "The one thing that's really sacred in our profession is the attorney-client privilege," he said. "What the defendant did goes to the very fabric of our profession. He abused that."

Mr. Neppl was arrested in February and pleaded guilty in July as part of a plea agreement.

At the request of Mr. Neppl's attorney, Donovan Robertson, Judge McDade said Mr. Neppl would serve in a minimum security prison in either Wisconsin or South Dakota so he could be close to his family.

In the immortal words of Rick James, "Cocaine is a hell of a drug."