A New York City man connected to a convicted central Maine drug dealer was sentenced Wednesday to five years in prison for his role in the ring.

William Waters, 33, was sentenced Wednesday in U.S. District Court to five years in prison and three years of supervised release for possession of oxycodone with intent to distribute, according to U.S. Attorney Thomas Delahanty.

Waters was charged with being a courier for Maurice McCray, who was sentenced Tuesday to more than 15 years in prison for conspiring to sell drugs brought from New York City to Somerset and Kennebec counties.

According to a news release from Delahanty, Chief Judge John A. Woodcock told Waters that his name was “all over the Maurice McCray case” and told him the March 15 event in Waterville was “not a one-time event.”

Waters pleaded guilty in March to the charge about a year after he was first arrested with Ebony Howard, who was sentenced earlier this week to nearly two years in prison.

Waterville police arrested the two after receiving information that Waters and Howard would be coming to the city with a large amount of oxycodone, then searching the area and eventually locating them late that night.

Waters and Howard were driven to police headquarters, where officers seized 645 30-mg oxycodone tablets from Howard, prosecutors said.

“Waters admitted that Howard was doing him a favor transporting the pills, that he got them in New York City and that he intended to distribute them to customers in Maine,” the news release said.

The case was investigated by the Waterville Police Department along with the Maine Drug Enforcement Agency and the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration.