Authorities say they’ve busted a major heroin trafficking operation between California and Mexico. Officials say the effort has netted 200 kilos of the drug worth 17-million dollars and 670-thousand dollars in cash.
Capital Public Radio's Steve Shadley reports...
The acting U-S Attorney in Sacramento, Larry Brown, says 21 people have been indicted. He says the 18-month investigation used court-approved wiretaps to uncover the drug ring that produced the heroin in Michoacan (ME-cho-uh-con)
Mexico, and distributed it through Los Angeles to Modesto and finally San Francisco.
Brown says it shows the heroin trade is becoming more popular in California, based on the price of the drug...
“The cheaper the product, the greater the demand. And, we knew that at this 140-dollar an ounce price, this was going to directly from the manufacturers down in Mexico, up to Modesto, because it hadn’t been marked up much along the way...”
Brown says the heroin was smuggled into the U-S at the border crossing in Tijuana. He says the traffickers hid the drug in fake gas tanks in three cars. Brown says five suspects remain at large in Mexico and warrants have been issued
for six others in the United States.