A U.S. District Court today sentenced 39-year-old Tommy Pham, of Newcastle, Washington, to 10 years in prison for his leadership role in supplying and distributing methamphetamine, heroin, cocaine, and fentanyl to people in Seattle’s homeless encampments and in areas of the Chinatown-International District, including 12th & Jackson.
Agents arrested Pham and four others in January last year.
The judge in the case also ordered five years of supervised release, after Pham’s sentence ends.
In handing down her decision, Judge Tana Lin told Pham, “You weren’t only playing with your own life but with the lives of thousands of people for the drugs you were pumping into our community. … Think of the impact not only on your family but all the other families impacted by addiction…. The combo of drugs and guns significantly increases the risk of harm.”
The Seattle Police Department, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, and the Drug Enforcement Agency began investigating the drug trafficking ring Pham and others belonged to. Investigators used wiretaps to gather evidence of drug dealing. Over the course of the investigation, agents made arrests and seizures, and listened to intimations of violence on the calls they tapped.
Pham was found slumped in his car with a loaded 9mm Glock 19 with 15 rounds of ammunition, eight grams of methamphetamine, and $1,322 in cash in December 2024, shortly before the January 2025 arrest operation.
During that operation, agents arrested members of the ring for dealing fentanyl, methamphetamine, cocaine, and heroin, but only some, including Pham, had weapons. Law enforcement seized 17 firearms and different amounts of controlled substances.
Five of the firearms came from Pham’s residence and vehicle, and agents also found small amounts of methamphetamine, heroin, and cocaine in his home. They arrested Pham at a nearby casino with methamphetamine, marijuana, and one firearm.
Pham pleaded guilty in February 2026. Prosecutors asked for a 157-month sentence, saying that he was the leader of a drug trafficking organization that distributed to “some of the most marginalized communities.”
“His role as a leader and a source of supply of these deadly and addictive substances, while possessing multiple firearms, demands a considerable sentence,” prosecutors said. “Not only are these substances potentially deadly to users based on consumption, because traffickers operate entirely outside the law and because trafficking in the substance is so financially lucrative, violence is attendant to controlled substance trafficking. Not coincidentally, each time Pham was encountered by law enforcement, he was consistently found with loaded firearms.”
Acting U.S. Attorney Neil Floyd said that this was not Pham’s first conviction or prison sentence, and that he had already served a three-year federal prison sentence for dealing drugs and illegal possession of high-powered firearms. Floyd said Pham used those weapons to protect his drug business.
“As a leader and supplier for this organization,” said W. Mike Herrington, Special Agent in Charge of the FBI Seattle field office, “Pham worked with many of the other conspirators, selling them the dangerous drugs that plagued vulnerable communities in Seattle. FBI Seattle and our partners will continue to pursue drug traffickers to hold them accountable for the violence, addiction, and suffering they bring to our neighborhoods.”
Of the ring, Pham is the fifth and final defendant to be sentenced. In February, Theodore Nation, 36, of Seattle was sentenced to 30 months in prison. In April, the court sentenced Khampheth Keodara, 43, of Seattle to 75 months in prison. The court sentenced both Donfeuy Saephan, 55, of Seattle, to 120 months in prison and Sang Tran, 55, of Kent, Washington, to 66 months in prison in July.
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