BEAUMONT, Texas – On Jan. 27, 2020, Houston High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area Executive Director Mike McDaniel and DEA Houston Division Acting Special Agent in Charge Steven S. Whipple are pleased to announce the establishment of a new HIDTA initiative in Beaumont, Jefferson County, Texas. The mission of the DEA-led...

WACO, Texas – On Jan. 24, 2020, a federal jury convicted 27–year-old Francisco Resendez Martinez of Gonzales, California, for attempting to deliver approximately 21 pounds of methamphetamine from California to Waco, announced U.S. Attorney John F. Bash and DEA Houston Division Acting Special Agent in Charge Steven S. Whipple. Jurors...

SEATTLE – A repeat offender, who was arrested in Pioneer Square armed with a concealed pistol with hollow point bullets, was sentenced today in U.S. District Court in Seattle to 101 months in prison and five years of supervised release. Jonathan Rushing, 40, was convicted in October 2019 following a...

PORTLAND, Ore . – Darlene Michelle Sturdevant, 61, of Vancouver, Wash., was sentenced today to 14 years in federal prison and five years’ supervised release for conspiring to possess with intent to distribute methamphetamine and heroin throughout the Portland metropolitan area, possessing with intent to distribute heroin, and committing an...

SEATTLE -- A Skagit County resident who operated businesses in Burlington and Sedro Woolley, Washington was sentenced on Jan. 17, 2020, in U.S. District Court in Tacoma to 18 months in prison for his role in knowingly laundering cash drug proceeds for a drug cartel. Orlando Barajas, 41, owns and...

SEATTLE – Matthew Sean Bremond, 32, of Soldotna, Alaska, was sentenced yesterday by Sr. U.S. District Judge Ralph R. Beistline, to serve nine years in federal prison, followed by five years of supervised release, for distributing large quantities of heroin throughout the Kenai Peninsula. In September 2019, Bremond pleaded guilty...

ANCHORAGE, Alaska – Gian Carlo Clemente Pangilinan, 23, of Anchorage, was found guilty on Jan. 10, 2019, after a three-day federal jury trial. The jury found Pangilinan guilty of one count of possession of more than 50 grams of methamphetamine with the intent to distribute. According to evidence presented at...

PORTLAND, Ore. - Jody Tremayne Wafer, 30, of Houston, Texas, was sentenced today to 84 months in federal prison and three years’ supervised release for organizing and leading a conspiracy to traffic marijuana grown in Portland to Texas. According to court documents, drug proceeds, in the form of bulk U.S...

LAREDO, Texas – Jesus Homero Ortiz, a 27-year-old resident of Laredo has been sentenced to federal prison for his role in a conspiracy to possess with the intent to distribute nearly eight kilograms of fentanyl, announced DEA Acting Special Agent in Charge Steven S. Whipple and U.S. Attorney Ryan K...

PORTLAND, Ore .—David Carl Paulsen, 33, of Bend, Oregon, was sentenced on Dec.10, 2019, to 12 months and one day in federal prison and two years’ supervised release for illegally manufacturing and possessing marijuana during a March 2018 butane honey oil explosion in Bend. According to court documents, on March...