Federal authorities said Wednesday they seized more than a half-ton of methamphetamine and charged 15 people after a two-year investigation that disrupted what prosecutors described as a Mexico-based drug trafficking organization operating across Colorado. Eleven suspects have been arrested, while four others, including the alleged leader of the network, remain at large and are believed to be in Mexico, according to the Colorado U.S. Attorney’s Office.
During a news conference, Dave Olesky, the Drug Enforcement Administration’s special agent in charge, said the investigation uncovered direct connections to criminal elements in Mexico, including ties to the Sinaloa and Jalisco cartels. He did not take questions, and a DEA spokesperson declined to provide further details. The two cartels, long considered among the world’s most influential criminal networks, were recently designated as foreign terrorist organizations by the administration of President Donald Trump.
An arrest affidavit stated that the seized methamphetamine amounted to millions of individual doses. Most of the drugs — roughly 1,115 pounds, or 505 kilograms — were discovered in April hidden in the corners of boxes of pear squash imported from Mexico and found at a property in Lakewood, a suburb of Denver. Nearly 100 pounds, or 45 kilograms, were intercepted in December on a Greyhound bus passing through Vail. Investigators had obtained a warrant to track a cellphone used by a suspected dealer and were waiting when the bus arrived in the ski resort town. The drugs were headed toward the Denver metropolitan area, U.S. Attorney Peter McNeilly said.
Marv Massey, acting FBI special agent in charge, said the coordinated investigation dismantled a major criminal supply chain. “This is one supply chain that needed to be broken,” he said.
