Obama commutes sentence of Bradenton rapper Tampa Tony

Tampa Tony may be rapping in the Bay area sooner than expected.

President Barack Obama granted commutations of the sentences to 72 inmates Friday, including a Bradenton rapper serving life in prison on two cocaine possession charges.

Antonio Lee Alls, Tampa Tony’s real name, has served 104 months of his life sentence since March 5, 2008, but his sentencing was shortened to 240 months on March 18.

The now 41-year-old was convicted of conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute and possession with intent to distribute more than five kilograms of cocaine. He is currently at Talladega Federal Correctional Institute in Alabama.

Obama commuted Alls’ sentence to a 150-month prison term, which means he would be released in 2020.

Alls was arrested Oct. 12, 2006 after he accepted a delivery of 24 kilograms of cocaine. Federal law enforcement agents seized $20,000 from All’s vehicle that day and $219,000 from a home in the 12400 block of White Bluff Drive in Hudson.

Law enforcement had used a confidential informant in order to build the case against Alls and his co-defendants, according to court documents.

The confidential informant went to the Arizona home of Sergio Medina, who pleaded guilty to charges in the same case, and picked up a total of 24 kilograms of cocaine between Oct. 5 -6, 2006. The cocaine was scheduled to be taken in a tractor trailer co-defendant Julio Cesar Hernandez-Varela home in Wesley Chapel.

Instead, the confidential informant took the cocaine to the Drug Enforcement Administration. On Oct. 12, 2006, “sham” cocaine was later delivered to Hernandez-Varela at a restaurant in Florida. Agents kept a surveillance on Hernandez-Varela who then took the cocaine to the Hudson home.

Hernandez-Varela showed the cocaine to co-defendant Jose Olegario Rivas-Gastelum. Both were arrested when they left the home without the cocaine. Rivas-Gastelum allowed agents to search the home and they found about $220,000.00 in the attic and $3,000.00 in another closet.

Hernandez-Varela later made a delivery of the "sham" cocaine with an undercover officer to Alls in a store parking lot in Wesley Chapel.

This story was originally published November 4, 2016 at 3:07 PM with the headline "Obama commutes sentence of Bradenton rapper Tampa Tony."