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Columbia University Drug Dealer Sentenced to Six Months in Jail

By DNAinfo Staff on August 30, 2011 2:32pm  | Updated on August 30, 2011 2:33pm

MANHATTAN — One of the five Columbia University students arrested as part of a high-profile drug bust last year was taken into custody Tuesday to begin serving a six-month jail sentence for selling cocaine, prosecutors confirmed.

Harrison David, the 20-year-old former Ivy Leaguer, pleaded guilty to felony criminal sale of a controlled substance last July in exchange for a plea deal that will likely only require him to spend 3 1/2 months in jail with good behavior and time served, his attorney said.

The son of a Boston-area plastic surgeon, David spent nearly two weeks in jail after his friends were bailed out. Upon his arrest, David told police that he was dealing drugs out of the Alpha Epsilon Pi fraternity house to pay his tuition, though his father reportedly claimed to have been paying it “since Day 1.”

Prosecutors had originally offered him one year in prison, including two years probation. But David, who admitted to selling cocaine to an undercover cop, turned the deal down. Under the new agreement, he will remain on probation for five years after his release.

"We believe that less incarceration time and the additional three years of monitoring will serve in the interest of justice," Assistant District Attorney William Novak, of the Office of the Special Narcotics Prosecutor, said at the time of David’s plea.

A lawyer for the prep school salutatorian had argued for a jail-free sentence, insisting that incarceration "pales in comparison to the damage that's already been done."

“[H]e's blown an Ivy League education," attorney Matthew Myers said.

David is the first of the five students arrested in “Operation Ivy League,” a five-month investigation in which undercover officers purchased $11,000 worth of illegal drugs, to be sentenced.

Prosecutors have said they will not seek jail time for the other four defendants, who are accused of dealing marijuana, cocaine, powdered Ecstasy, Adderall and LSD. They are due back in court on Sept. 23.