MACHIAS – A Machias man was convicted Tuesday of aggravated trafficking in a prescription pain-reliever.

A Washington County Superior Court jury of seven men and five women deliberated for less than a half-hour before finding Steven Barnard, 39, guilty of selling two 4-milligram tablets of the prescription pain-reliever Dilaudid to a confidential informant for the Maine Drug Enforcement Agency last March 29.

Confidential informants are people who have been arrested on drug charges and agree to provide information or make undercover drug purchases in hopes of receiving a shorter sentence.

Barnard was charged with aggravated trafficking because the sale took place in a Calais apartment that is within 1,000 feet of Calais Middle School.

According to closing arguments in Barnard’s one-day trial before Justice Donald Marden, the confidential informant was wearing a recording device when he went to Barnard’s apartment and bought the pills for $25 each.

The wire allowed agent Richard Rolfe to listen to the transaction.

Rolfe gave the informant the money and the informant brought back the pills to Rolfe.

But Carol Lewis, Barnard’s attorney, told the jury during her closing arguments that there was reason to doubt that the informant bought the drugs from Barnard.

Referring to earlier testimony by two defense witnesses, Lewis told the jury the informant was skilled at hiding drugs on or in his body. He could easily have told Rolfe that he bought them from Barnard in hopes of getting a better deal for himself, Lewis said

The informant has yet to be tried on his charge of unlawful trafficking, and Lewis reminded the jury of the testimony of a Baileyville woman who said she had accompanied the informant on several trips to New Brunswick, where he bought Dilaudid for $12.50 a pill and brought it across the border in a plastic bag concealed under his tongue.

The woman testified that 4-milligram Dilaudids sell for $25 in Calais and that she had gone to Canada with the informant on a number of occasions to buy Dilaudid.

Erickson told the jury there was no reason for the informant to try to “play” the agent “for a fool.”

The man is facing a serious charge and it was in his best interest to cooperate, Erickson said.

Barnard will be sentenced Jan. 23.

Erickson said aggravated trafficking in Schedule W drugs is a Class A felony, and Barnard could be sentenced to anywhere from the four-year mandatory minimum to 20 years.