The Wire creator seeks leniency for drug dealer in Michael K Williams' death

Williams, who starred as robber Omar Little in the HBO crime drama, died of an overdose aged 54 in 2021.

Carlos Macci is one of four men charged for selling Williams the heroin laced with fentanyl that killed him.

Macci, 71, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to distribute narcotics in April. He is expected to be sentenced this month.

In a three-page letter filed by Macci's lawyer on Thursday, Mr Simon asked the New York judge for mercy when handing down a sentence to Macci because Williams "believed in redemption".

"No possible good can come from incarcerating a 71-year-old soul, largely illiterate, who has himself struggled with a lifetime of addiction and who has not engaged in street-level sales of narcotics with ambitions of success and profit but rather as someone caught up in the diaspora of addiction himself," Mr Simon said.

"[Williams] fought hard for his own and for everyone in Baltimore, Brooklyn and everywhere else he encountered. He would fight for Mr Macci," he added.

Macci has been in jail since his arrest in 2022. Mr Simon's letter is a part of a larger filing in which Macci's lawyer asks a judge to give him a sentence of time served, or the amount of time he has already spent in jail, one and a half years.

As overdose deaths in the US continue to rise, some prosecutors have charged victims' friends who helped obtain such drugs, as well as the dealers. Several states have passed laws in recent years allowing prosecutors to charge overdoses as homicides in an effort to discourage people from selling or sharing fentanyl.

Williams, who talked openly about his struggles with addiction, won critical acclaim for his role in The Wire, a series that ran from 2002-08 and explored the narcotics scene in Baltimore from the perspective of law enforcement as well as drug dealers and users.

Prosecutors say that on 5 September 2021, Macci and other members of a drug-trafficking organisation sold Williams heroin laced with fentanyl and continued to sell the substance even after they knew the actor had suffered a fatal overdose.

The court's probation office has recommended 10 years in prison.

The three other men charged in connection with William's death have also pleaded guilty.

In his letter, Mr Simon - a former Baltimore police reporter - described his friendship with Williams as well as the actor's struggles with addiction.

Mr Simon said Williams would believe only he himself should bear the responsibility for what happened.

"It is this attitude - coupled with Michael's publicly stated opposition to mass incarceration and the drug war... that convinces me that he would want me to write this letter," he said.

-bbc