SPRINGFIELD, Mo. – An Aurora, Missouri, man was sentenced in federal court today for illegally possessing firearms after leading law enforcement officers on a high-speed chase from Bolivar, Mo., to Springfield, Mo. Milton W. Sparks, 38, was sentenced by U.S. District Judge M. Douglas Harpool to 15 years in federal...

ST. LOUIS – A federal grand jury indicted Steven Bell, along with 19 other defendants, for charges that include conspiracy to distribute heroin, fentanyl, cocaine and methamphetamine in a large-scale nationwide drug ring. The group transported and distributed illegal narcotics in numerous states to include California, Michigan, Missouri, Kentucky and...

CHARLOTTE, N.C. – James Kristoffer Cantley, 39, formerly of Newton, N.C., was sentenced today by U.S. District Judge Kenneth D. Bell to 210 months in prison and five years of supervised release for trafficking methamphetamine, announced William T. Stetzer, Acting U.S. Attorney for the Western District of North Carolina. In...

BROOKLYN, N.Y. -- Fabian Emilio Zapata Taborda, also known as “Milo” and “Milito,” was arraigned today before United States District Judge Kiyo A. Matsumoto at the federal courthouse in Brooklyn on an indictment charging him with leading an international cocaine distribution conspiracy. The defendant, a Colombian citizen, was arrested in...

NEW YORK -- A three-month investigation disrupted a Georgia-to-New York gun trafficking pipeline and resulted in the seizure of 25 guns, including five assault weapons. The guns and a quantity of cocaine were sold to an undercover officer. Ray Donovan, Special Agent in Charge of the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration’s...

LOS ANGELES —The culmination of a three-month investigation resulted in a Santa Barbara methamphetamine distributor being sentenced on November 8, 2021 to 180 months in federal prison for narcotics violations. Cesar Castillo-Pena, 35, of San Bernardino, California, was sentenced by United States District Judge R. Gary Klausner. On July 28...

EAST ST. LOUIS, Ill. - Lamondra Beckley, 43, of St. Louis, was sentenced to 147 months in prison on Wednesday, November 10, 2021, in federal court in East St. Louis, Illinois. Beckley had previously pled guilty in federal court to one count of possession with intent to distribute methamphetamine, one...

BEAUMONT, Texas – A federal grand jury in Beaumont has returned a three-count indictment charging nine individuals in drug trafficking conspiracy in the Eastern District of Texas, announced Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) Special Agent in Charge Daniel C. Comeaux, Houston Division and Acting U.S. Attorney Nicholas J. Ganjei today. The...

SAN DIEGO - Angel Dominguez Ramirez Jr. of Tamaulipas, Mexico, pleaded guilty in federal court today to drug and money laundering charges, admitting that he was the leader of a trafficking organization that transported ton-quantities of cocaine from South America to Mexico and into the United States. According to court...

ST. LOUIS – A federal grand jury indicted Derek Rockette of St. Louis for charges that include conspiracy to distribute and to possess with the intent to distribute cocaine and fentanyl. The indictment also alleges in a money laundering conspiracy charge that Rockette, Norma Corina Armenta-Lizarraga, Jian Zhong Fang, Yuede...