SPOKANE, Wash.– United States District Judge Mary K. Dimke sentenced Kenneth H. Crause, age 55, to 204 months in federal prison after Crause pleaded guilty to Possession with Intent to Deliver 400 Grams or More of Fentanyl. Judge Dimke also ordered that, following his sentence, Crause be placed on a...

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...

SEATTLE – Two Skagit County residents are charged in U.S. District Court in Seattle in connection with a drug distribution ring selling fake oxycodone pills laced with fentanyl in Whatcom and Skagit Counties. The pills are linked to the overdose death of a 17-year-old Bellingham teen. Rosaliana Lopez-Rodriguez, 21, of...

SEATTLE - Jaime Montalvo-Mariscal, 27, of Pasco, Washington, was sentenced Nov. 18, 2019, after having pleaded guilty on July 22, 2019, for conspiracy to traffic in methamphetamine, fentanyl and heroin. Senior U.S. District Judge Nielsen sentenced Montalvo-Mariscal to 210 months in prison. DEA Special Agent in Charge Keith Weis was...

SEATTLE - Federal, state and local law enforcement fanned out across the Puget Sound region today arresting 17 people in connection with multiple counts of drug trafficking. The drug trafficking organization brought large loads of heroin and methamphetamine into the Seattle area. In one instance law enforcement seized 33 pounds...

SEATTLE – With robust public participation over the course of 17 prior events, the National Prescription Drug Take Back Day Initiative continues to remove ever-higher amounts of opioids and other medicines from the nation’s homes, where they are vulnerable to misuse, theft or abuse by family members and visitors, including...

POCATELLO, Idaho – Francis R. Casildo, 36, of Salt Lake City, Utah, was sentenced to 235 months in federal prison for possession with intent to distribute methamphetamine and conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute a controlled substance. U.S. District Judge B. Lynn Winmill also sentenced Casildo to serve five...

MEDFORD, Ore.—Five people were arrested on Oct. 9th, 2019, for their roles in a conspiracy to distribute methamphetamine and heroin manufactured in Mexico in and around Klamath Falls, Oregon. Rogelio Gomez-Arias, 23, Irving Beas Ceballos, 34, Alexis Chavez-Franco, 22, and Domingo Matias-Hernandez, 36, are each charged by indictment with conspiring...

ANCHORAGE, Alaska – Special agents with the Drug Enforcement Administration arrested an Anchorage nurse practitioner and a Soldotna doctor on separate federal narcotics charges, which allege that they illegally distributed large amounts of opioids and other powerful narcotics by writing prescriptions for "patients" without medical examinations and lacking medical necessity...

ANCHORAGE, Alaska – Michael Joseph Nicholson, 36, of Los Angeles, California, was sentenced on Oct. 8, 2019, by U.S. District Judge Timothy M. Burgess, to 10 years in prison, to be followed by a 5-year term of supervised release, for his role in a drug and money laundering conspiracy that...