York real estate broker serving 4 years in federal prison for drug smuggling

The York real estate broker arrested nearly three years ago on marijuana trafficking charges will spend four years in federal prison, officials said Thursday.

James Michael “Mike” Wiley, 59, was sentenced in Greenville and in California after pleading guilty on drug charges, said Marvin Brown, commander of the York County Multijurisdictional Drug Enforcement Unit. The drug unit first arrested Wiley in November 2012 on a fugitive warrant from California.

Wiley was accused of mailing shipments of marijuana from a home he owned in California to his residence in York. Federal authorities intercepted the drug packages. Officials said they confiscated two crates of marijuana, weighing nearly 90 pounds.

A police search at Wiley’s California home uncovered an additional 300 pounds of marijuana, Brown said. In York, drug agents found a crate at Wiley’s home with marijuana residue inside, but he was not arrested until later that month on the fugitive charge.

Last May, the county’s drug enforcement unit and the State Law Enforcement Division charged Wiley with trafficking marijuana.

Before his arrests, Wiley was broker-in-charge at White Rose Realty on U.S. 321 in York.

Brown says SLED had a case on Wiley dating back to 2009. His arrest was part of a drug trafficking bust in several South Carolina counties. Police alleged Wiley was involved in a 35-person drug operation funneling narcotics around the Upstate.

After pleading guilty earlier this year, Wiley was sentenced to three years and one month in federal prison by the U.S. District Court Eastern Division of California. In federal court in Greenville, he was sentenced to four years in prison. Brown said Wiley will serve his time concurrently.

Wiley is imprisoned at the Federal Correctional Institution in Butner, N.C., records show. The prison website states his projected release date is Nov. 12, 2017.

This story was originally published July 23, 2015 at 5:35 PM with the headline "York real estate broker serving 4 years in federal prison for drug smuggling."