Department of Justice

NEW HAVEN, Conn. — Vanessa Roberts Avery, U.S. Attorney for the District of Connecticut, announced that Carlyle Henry, 39, of New Haven, pleaded guilty today before U.S. District Judge Stefan R. Underhill in Bridgeport to a drug trafficking and firearm possession offense.

According to court documents and statement made in court, shortly before midnight on Oct. 12, 2022, Henry crashed his vehicle on a retaining wall on the Yale University campus. Henry was arrested after Yale Police found a loaded 9mm semi-automatic handgun and a bag containing distribution quantities of cocaine, packaged heroin and fentanyl and counterfeit pills containing fentanyl.

Henry pleaded guilty to possession of a firearm in furtherance of a drug trafficking crime, which carries a mandatory minimum term of imprisonment of five years and a maximum term of imprisonment of life. Judge Underhill scheduled sentencing for February 7, 2024.

Henry has been detained since his arrest.

Henry’s criminal history includes state convictions for firearms possession and narcotics distribution offenses and a federal narcotics conviction in 2006 for which he received a sentence of 50 months of imprisonment.

This case has been investigated by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives and the Yale Police Department. The case is being prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Lauren Clark through Project Safe Neighborhoods (PSN), the centerpiece of the Department of Justice’s violent crime reduction efforts. PSN is an evidence-based program proven to be effective at reducing violent crime. Through PSN, a broad spectrum of stakeholders work together to identify the most pressing violent crime problems in the community and develop comprehensive solutions to address them. As part of this strategy, PSN focuses enforcement efforts on the most violent offenders and partners with locally based prevention and reentry programs for lasting reductions in crime.

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