CONCORD – A Nashua man arrested nearly two years ago following a cocaine-trafficking investigation by local, state and federal authorities has pleaded guilty to a felony charge, and is now scheduled for sentencing.

Manuel Perkins, 28, entered a guilty plea in U.S. District Court to the charge of possession of cocaine with intent to distribute, according to U.S. Attorney Scott W. Murray.

Perkins’s sentencing hearing, which will also take place is U.S. District Court, is currently scheduled for June 1, Murray said.

Perkins is accused of selling roughly eight ounces of cocaine to a cooperating police informant on three occasions between June 4 and July 11, 2019, Murray said.

Investigators then prepared a warrant for Perkins’s arrest, and about three weeks later, on July 30, 2019, agents pulled over the car he was driving and took him into custody, Murray said.

He said Perkins was on his way to meet the police informant to allegedly conduct a “pre-arranged sale of approximately eight ounces of cocaine” when the agents pulled him over and arrested him.

A post-arrest search of Perkins turned up $1,331 in his possession, Murray said. Agents conducting a subsequent search of Perkins’s vehicle located a backpack containing more than 221 grams of cocaine, he added.

Murray didn’t say whether the motor vehicle stop and arrest took place in Nashua or in another jurisdiction.

Perkins’s guilty plea “underscores the importance of law enforcement partners working together in the fight against narcotics traffickers,” said William S. Walker, acting special agent in charge of the Boston office of Homeland Investigations.

“One of HSI’s highest priorities (is) disrupting drug traffickers who continue to pump deadly narcotics into our communities,” Walker added.

Perkins’s case is one of many on which New Hampshire state police, federal Homeland Security investigators and local law enforcement agencies have, and are, collaborating “to stop the sale of cocaine and other dangerous drugs” in the state, according to Murray.

According to a news bulletin issued Tuesday morning, the Perkins case is one of the final cases over which Murray will preside in his capacity as the state’s chief federal law enforcement officer.

Murray, in a fairly lengthy statement, announced his resignation effective this Saturday, one day short of three years of service as the state’s U.S. attorney.

Murray, who was nominated for the post in December 2017 by former president Donald Trump, indicated in the statement that he submitted his resignation “in response to President Biden’s call to replace nearly all remaining” U.S. attorneys who were appointed by Trump and confirmed by the U.S. Senate.

Murray said in the statement that “it has been my greatest honor and privilege to serve as U.S. attorney for the past three years.

“I am deeply grateful to have had the opportunity to protect the people of New Hampshire through the application of federal law. For a career prosecutor, this was the chance of a lifetime.”

First Assistant U.S. Attorney John J. Farley will serve as acting United States attorney until a new presidentially-appointed U.S. attorney takes office, according to the statement.

Dean Shalhoup may be reached at 594-1256 or dshalhoup@nashuatelegraph.com.

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