‘The Wire’ co-creator David Simon calls for release of dealer who sold Michael K. Williams’ fatal dose

The co-creator of HBO’s “The Wire” is urging leniency for the drug dealer who sold fentanyl to Michael K. Williams before his fatal overdose — saying the beloved actor “bears the fuller responsibility” for the tragedy.

In an emotional three-page letter, David Simon pressed Manhattan Judge Ronnie Abrams to consider a lesser punishment for 71-year-old Carlos Macci, Manhattan federal court papers show.

“What happened to Mike is a grievous tragedy,” Simon wrote of the actor, who died from an overdose of fentanyl-laced heroin at his Brooklyn penthouse on Sept. 6, 2021.

“But I know that Michael would look upon the undone and desolate life of Mr. Macci and know two things with certainty: First, that it was Michael who bears the fuller responsibility for what happened.”

Macci — one of four suspects spotted selling Williams drugs hand to hand a day before his death — is “largely illiterate” and sells drugs because he is “caught up in the diaspora of addiction himself,” Simon says.

He also cites Williams’ own long-held opposition to mass incarceration and a failed war on drugs, and concludes that “no possible good can come from incarcerating a 71-year-old soul,” according to the letter first reported by the New York Times.

“The Wire” ran on HBO from 2002 through 2008, and drew in part on Simon’s experiences as a Baltimore police reporter to recount the stories of investigators and dealers entrenched in the city’s illicit drug trade.

According to Simon’s letter, Williams opened up about his own drug addiction during the show’s third season.

“Then, to stay at work — which was, in fact, a stabilizing influence in his life — [Williams] readily agreed to let us help him address his drug use, going so far as to seek the constant companionship of a crew member whose job was to assure some distance between Mike and temptation,” he recalled.

Williams also frequently discussed his addiction battle in the years after “The Wire” went off the air, admitting in his posthumous memoir, “Scenes from My Life,” that crack and cocaine use cost him his home while filming the second season.

“I had nowhere to live and my mother was trying to get me to go to rehab, but I was not having it,” he wrote of the devastating time.

Williams attributes his drug use in part to the sexual abuse he experienced as a child.

“After two men in positions of authority — one from school and one from church — molested me, I fell into an empty, dark state. It was like a hole I couldn’t dig myself out of,” he explained.

“[O]nce crack cocaine came into my life, it just moved the f–k in. Everything else took a backseat.”

Williams even copped to being high on cocaine when he met Barack Obama, who was then a junior senator from Illinois.

“I was not in my right mind. I told people I was nervous but actually I had lockjaw from too much cocaine,” he recalled.

In his letter to the judge, Simon wrote that Williams was realistic about his addiction, and always maintained the decision to use drugs was his — and his alone.

“I never failed to see him take responsibility for himself and his decisions,” he said, noting the late performer was “one of the finest actors” and “one of the most thoughtful, gracious and charitable souls.”

Macci’s sentencing is set for later this month, the Times reported. His lawyer, Benjamin Zeman, is requesting a sentence of time served, which would amount to about one and a half years.

Simon’s letter was included with a filing from Zeman, who said he asked the former journalist to contribute because “he’s been such a thoughtful and eloquent voice about what the failure of the war on drugs has wrought, and I knew of his relationship with Mr. Williams and all that Mr. Williams had spoken about this subject during the course of his life.”

In addition to the charge related to Williams’ death, Macci has 23 prior drug convictions.