 A 44-year-old man from Detroit, Michigan has been sentenced to five years in prison for distributing heroin on the Leech Lake Indian Reservation. Raymond Anthony Poole pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy on August 24th of 2018 and was sentenced today in U.S. District Court in Minneapolis. According to his guilty plea in documents filed in court, between April 2016 and March 2017, Poole conspired with other individuals to distribute about 227 grams of heroin between Minneapolis, Bemidji, Cass Lake, and on the Leech Lake Indian Reservation. Motorists traveling between Hackensack and Backus on Highway 371 will be glad to know that the detour that is at over 20 miles to the commute has opened back up to drivers. The construction project began Labor Day weekend with the detour beginning September 4th. The detour rerouted drivers in Long County Road Highway 64 and Highway 87 and added 23 miles to the trip. The detour ended on Tuesday and Highway 371 between the two cities was open to traffic. The project reconstructed the road, the road's pavement and replaced underground piping. The construction's been going quite well actually. We were actually ahead of schedule for quite a while. We had hoped to pull the detour a week early and then October's rains sort of got in the way and pushed it back to where we kind of thought it would open anyway on October 16th. So the detour was lifted on Tuesday, October 16th, but there will still be a few days of lane closures left. We still need to get the striping put down. All lands of Highway 371 between Highway 87 and County Road 40 are expected to be open by the end of October. If you enjoyed this segment of Lakeland News, please consider making a tax-deductible contribution to Lakeland PBS.