ANCHORAGE, Alaska – The final defendant in a Southeast Alaska drug trafficking conspiracy pleaded guilty today to conspiring to traffic drugs and launder money connected to a transnational drug trafficking enterprise. According to court documents, on Aug. 24, 2022, U.S. Postal Inspectors seized a suspicious package addressed to Patricia Seal-Uttke...

Spokane, Wash. – Jose Efrain Gonzalez-Rodriguez, age 24, of Mexico, who was unlawfully present in the United States, was sentenced after pleading guilty to drug trafficking and firearm charges. United States District Judge Thomas O. Rice imposed a sentence of 120 months in prison to be followed by 5 years...

ANCHORAGE, Alaska--A federal grand jury in Alaska returned an indictment yesterday charging a Wasilla man with distributing Carfentanil to two individuals, resulting in the non-fatal overdose of an adult victim and the fatal overdose of a minor. Per court documents, the Alaska Bureau of Investigations (ABI) discovered that between Nov...

EUGENE, Ore.— The leader of a Lane County, Oregon, drug trafficking cell was sentenced to federal prison today for possessing 384 pounds of methamphetamine, the largest single seizure of methamphetamine in Oregon State history and valued at over a million dollars. Martin Manzo Negrete, 51, a Mexican national unlawfully residing...

LOS ANGELES – The Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) announced today the arrest of four Los Angeles County men, on a seven-count federal indictment alleging they trafficked vast quantities of methamphetamine, cocaine, fentanyl powder, and counterfeit fentanyl pills and stored the narcotics at a safehouse in Compton. According to the DEA’s...

Seattle – Fourteen people were indicted in late May and eleven were taken into custody in coordinated arrests last week as part of an ongoing investigation of drug traffickers with ties to drug trafficking in Seattle’s International District and homeless encampments, announced Acting U.S. Attorney Teal Luthy Miller. The defendants...

Tacoma – A major redistributor for a South Sound-based drug trafficking ring that was connected to Aryan prison gangs was sentenced today in U.S. District Court in Tacoma to 126 months in prison, announced Acting U.S. Attorney Teal Luthy Miller. 46-year-old Joseph Hempel, of Burien, Washington, was a high-volume drug...

PORTLAND, Ore.—A Salem, Oregon man was sentenced to federal prison for possessing and trafficking more than 40 pounds of fentanyl, methamphetamine, and heroin. Rico Anthony Russell Rigutto, 46, was sentenced to 108 months in federal prison and five years’ supervised release. According to court documents, on December 14, 2021, as...

SEATTLE – A 38-year-old Mexican citizen who previously resided in Kent, Washington was sentenced today in U.S. District Court in Seattle to ten years in prison for drug trafficking. Ramon Duarte Garcia was arrested in June 2024, following a drug investigation lasting nearly four years. Between 2020 and June 2024...

ANCHORAGE, Alaska – A suspended member of the Alaska Bar was arrested Wednesday after a federal grand jury in Alaska returned an indictment charging him with maintaining a drug-involved premise for the purpose of distributing and using controlled substances, and with possessing firearms as a prohibited person and in furtherance...