Date: Dec. 5, 2024 Contact: newsroom@ci.irs.gov ST. LOUIS — Three men have pleaded guilty in federal court and admitted conducting thousands of sales of anabolic steroids. David Underwood pleaded guilty in U.S. District Court in St. Louis Thursday to one count of conspiracy to distribute and possess with the intent to distribute anabolic steroids. Andrew Moore pleaded guilty to that charge Monday. Jeffrey Swanson of Edwardsville, Ill., pleaded guilty in April to two counts of the same charge and was sentenced in July to 13 months in prison. Their plea agreements say that in November 2018, Swanson and a partner were distributing anabolic steroids via Facebook. By mid-2019, Swanson and Moore formed a new partnership to sell anabolic steroids through a Facebook page called “SP Online,” also known as “SP Pharma.” Moore and Swanson obtained raw steroids, then processed and packaged them for retail distribution. Customers ordered from a “menu” posted on the SP Online page and typically paid by mailing cash. Moore and Swanson then mailed out the steroids. An undercover officer made several purchases of anabolic steroids from Moore. During one buy, Moore told the undercover officer he purchased approximately one kilogram of raw product at a time. In roughly May 2020, Underwood and Swanson established a Facebook page labeled “LLL Online” to sell steroid products under the “Lay Low Labs” banner in the same manner as SP Online. Underwood later took over LLL Online and continued to sell steroids through the page. Swanson continued to sell steroids on his own. During the investigation, investigators recovered thousands of orders for steroids made from each page. Swanson admitted that more than 60,000 units of product were attributable to his actions or the conduct of other conspirators reasonably foreseeable to him. Underwood accepted responsibility for between 20,000 and 40,000 units and Moore for 40,000 to 60,000 units. The Internal Revenue Service Criminal Investigation (IRS-CI), the Drug Enforcement Administration, the U.S. Postal Inspection Service, and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration investigated the case. Assistant U.S. Attorney Stephen Casey is prosecuting the case. This effort is part of an Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Force (OCDETF) operation. OCDETF identifies, disrupts, and dismantles the highest-level criminal organizations that threaten the United States using a prosecutor-led, intelligence-driven, multi-agency approach. IRS-CI is the criminal investigative arm of the IRS, responsible for conducting financial crime investigations, including tax fraud, narcotics trafficking, money-laundering, public corruption, healthcare fraud, identity theft and more. IRS-CI special agents are the only federal law enforcement agents with investigative jurisdiction over violations of the Internal Revenue Code, obtaining a more than a 90 percent federal conviction rate. The agency has 20 field offices located across the U.S. and 12 attaché posts abroad.
