United States Drug Enforcement Administration

SEATTLE, Wash. – A U.S. citizen deeply enmeshed in an international drug smuggling conspiracy was sentence in U.S. District Court in Seattle to five years in prison. Just over a year ago, law enforcement teams from the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), Seattle Police Department and IRS Criminal Investigation executed 24 search or arrest warrants taking four people into custody who were linked to the drug trafficking conspiracy. 56-year-old Curtis McDaniel was arrested at a Tukwila motel and has been in custody ever since. The drug conspirators arrested on June 5, 2024, have ties to suppliers in Mexico and Colombia.

In sentencing McDaniel to five years in prison and four years of supervised release to follow his prison term, U.S. District Judge Tana Lin referenced the significant impact that McDaniel’s distribution of methamphetamine and cocaine have upon our community—specifically noting that methamphetamine and cocaine were the second and third most common substances involved in overdose deaths in King County in 2024.

Lead defendant Ramon Duarte Garcia, 37, a citizen of Mexico who lived in Kent, Washington, was identified as a significant drug supplier when law enforcement stopped him driving back to the Pacific Northwest with 12 pounds of methamphetamine in his vehicle, along with a stolen firearm and $10,000 in drug trafficking proceeds. Duarte Garcia, was sentenced to ten years in prison in May 2025. Defendant Humberto Lopez Rodriguez, 30, a citizen of Mexico, formerly of Renton, Washington, is scheduled for sentencing on July 30, 2025.

Over the course of the investigation, law enforcement seized 84,000 fentanyl pills, more than a kilogram of fentanyl powder, 32 kilograms of cocaine, 15 kilograms of methamphetamine nearly three kilograms of heroin, and $71,000 in drug proceeds. They recovered nine guns, including an AK-47.

The investigation is being led by the DEA and Seattle Police Department. The IRS Criminal Investigation and OCDETF Auditor for the U.S. Attorney’s Office are conducting the financial investigation that is focused on the money launderers responsible for the transfer of significant sums of drug trafficking proceeds to sources of supply in Mexico and Colombia. Additional assistance was provided by Renton Police Department, Centralia Police Department, Homeland Security Investigations (HSI), the Department of Housing and Urban Development Office of the Inspector General (HUD OIG), Washington State Patrol, Pierce County and Valley SWAT teams.

The Colombian National Police (CNP) and Colombian Prosecutor’s Office (Fiscalia General) partnered with U.S. law enforcement on this investigation. The Justice Department’s Narcotic and Dangerous Drug Section’s Office of the Judicial Attaché in Bogotá provided critical assistance.

The cases from this investigation are being prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorneys Joe Silvio and C. Andrew Colasurdo in the Western District of Washington