By Michael Donoghue
Vermont News First

BURLINGTON – An Addison County man, who a judge said has repeatedly lied to authorities, including about the fatal shooting of his brother in June 2023, has been sentenced in federal court to 2 ½ years in prison for drug trafficking.

Larry L. Lanpher Jr., who also was critically wounded when his brother was killed in the Leicester shooting on June 4, 2023, was sentenced for conspiracy to knowingly and intentionally distribute both crack and powder cocaine between January 2023 and August 2023 in Vermont and elsewhere.

Chief Federal Judge Christina Reiss told Lanpher, 32, that he is not likely to be much of a useful witness when the man charged with wounding him and killing his brother, Scott D. Lanpher, 35, goes on trial.

“If you lie to a federal judge, you’re likely to lie to anybody,” Reiss said after recapping his false statements to police, probation and the court.

Reiss said Lanpher’s fiancée was at the shooting and she did not support some claims or denials he was making about the case.

Laryssa Dutton, 30, of Leicester was sentenced in June to 13 months in federal prison with credit for time served.  She had pleaded guilty to the same felony conspiracy drug charge as Lanpher.

Dutton will be on three years supervised release when her prison term ends.

Reiss told Lanpher during the court hearing she was amazed he and Dutton continued to traffic in illegal drugs after he was wounded and his brother was killed at the family residence on U.S. 7.

“You went right back to drug dealing,” Reiss said to Lanpher, who had his father in the courtroom as part of a family delegation.

Lanpher had claimed he was not using drugs while on pre-trial release, but drugs tests proved otherwise, and he tried to tell the judge the tests were false.

Judge Reiss, in a rare sentencing move, rejected a defense request that Lanpher be given credit for acceptance of responsibility.  Reiss, who has been on the federal bench since December 2009, said the lies made it impossible to credit him for any acceptance.

Most defendants normally are given some credit for acceptance of responsibility when the federal sentencing guidelines are calculated.

“You are lucky you survived that shooting,” Reiss told Lanpher, who was wounded in the chest.

The reported shooter, Zaquikon T. Roy, 37, of Rutland and St. Albans, is still awaiting trial in U.S. District Court.  Roy, who left his wallet at the scene, has pleaded not guilty to his latest indictment that charges him with 15 felonies.

Roy was one of the drug suppliers for Dutton and Lanpher, court records show.

Roy’s girlfriend, Kimberly Coons Bouchard, 38, of St. Albans, who was present during the shooting, was allowed to plead guilty on Jan. 4, 2024 to two felony charges: conspiracy to distribute crack cocaine in Vermont and elsewhere between January and June 2023 and conspiracy to possess firearms to further her drug trafficking business during that time, records show.

Bouchard is enrolled in the Federal Drug Court in Burlington and is looking for a lighter sentence.  She is expected to be a witness at Roy’s trial.

Even before the shooting in the Addison County community of 1,100 residents, Bouchard was involved in three rounds of drug selling over 15 months in Franklin County, records show.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Wendy Fuller has said the Leicester  shooting was sparked by a plan by the Lanphers to steal money and drugs from Roy.

Roy reportedly sold the Lanphers crack cocaine at the Hannaford Supermarket parking lot in Middlebury earlier in the day, but when the brothers measured it they thought they had been shorted, record show. The sale was for eight grams of crack, but it appeared to be 4 grams, Fuller noted. The brothers set up a meeting with Roy for that night at their home to make up for the shortage, police said.

Both Lanpher and Dutton had significant crack addictions, Fuller has said.  Dutton used her Facebook account to conduct her drug business and she regularly sold to nearly 30 people, Fuller said in court papers.  Once the deals were arranged, Lanpher helped make the delivery, she said.

Fuller asked Reiss to impose a 37-month prison sentence for Lanpher.  Fuller said it was hard to follow Lanpher’s story.

“The reason it doesn’t make any sense is it is a lie,” Fuller said.

Reiss told Lanpher once he is free from prison he will be under federal supervised release conditions for three years. 

Defense lawyer Richard Bothfeld asked that Lanpher be considered for a “time served” sentence for the 8 months he has been in custody.  Bothfeld requested that if any additional time was required that Lanpher can serve it at the federal prison in Danbury, Conn. 

Once police arrived to arrest Lanpher and Dutton in March 2024, he remained in the trailer smoking crack before she answered the door, Fuller said.  Once inside, police found Lanpher in bed with a crack pipe, she said.

Roy, who is originally from Brooklyn, is well known to police in Vermont.  Court records show he has five felony drug convictions in Vermont, including sales, possession and conspiracy between 2009 and 2013.  He also has a felony gun conviction in New York in 2019, records show.

Four days after the double shooting, Addison County State’s Attorney Eva Vekos filed six felony charges against Roy, including second degree murder, attempted second degree murder, manslaughter, aggravated assault with a deadly weapon, aggravated assault and illegal possession of a firearm after being convicted of a violent crime, but asked for them to be filed under seal because Roy was on the run.

Vekos was working in conjunction with Fuller on the case.  The feds are now taking the lead

The FBI arrested Roy in Lewiston, Maine on a charge of unlawful flight to avoid prosecution on Aug. 10, 2023

Scott Lanpher died from multiple gunshot wounds to the upper body, according to the autopsy.

His younger brother was taken to Porter Medical Center in Middlebury and airlifted by helicopter to the UVM Medical Center in critical condition.  He remained there at least five days.

The indictment seeks the forfeiture of a 9-mm Taurus pistol and 13 9-mm bullets upon Roy’s conviction.

Records note Roy is also known as Roy Zaquikon and Chris Atwood.  He also uses the street names “Z” and Zay,” records show.

Also expected to be a witness at Roy’s trial is another co-defendant, Christopher Gagne, 34, of Highgate.  Gagne pleaded guilty to hosting Roy and Bouchard at his trailer at 518 St. Armand Road in Highgate Center in April 2023.  As part of the deal he allowed them to store and sell controlled substances at his trailer in exchange for drugs, the plea agreement noted.

Gagne was arrested in February 2024 and had a criminal history that included convictions for domestic assault, simple assault, violation of conditions of release, retail theft and violation of probation, court records show.

Fuller said Gagne had a history of failing to appear in court, violating court orders and committing crimes while under state court supervision.  He had pending charges of aggravated domestic assault, violation of conditions of release, retail theft and interfering with emergency services, records show.