Coast-to-coast Mexican heroin trafficking ring smashed

A 13-month investigation into an international drug smuggling operation led to the arrests of more than 200 people and sparked fears that an inexpensive but unusually potent form of heroin is entering mid-sized American cities.

A 13-month investigation into an international drug smuggling operation led to the arrests of more than 200 people and sparked fears that an inexpensive but unusually potent form of heroin is entering mid-sized American cities.

The Mexican-based ring is operating in cities from Honolulu to the Eastern U.S. markets usually supplied by Colombian dealers, officials said. It gained a foothold on the East Coast by underselling the Colombians by dlrs 800 to dlrs 1,000 per 1 ounce (28 grams) of heroin, Donnie Marshall, administrator of the Drug Enforcement Administration, said Thursday as officials announced a string of new arrests in the case.

The DEA was alarmed to find that the ring was selling dlrs 10 street doses of heroin, weighing half a gram, that were 60 percent to 85 percent pure heroin, said Rod Benson, deputy to the chief of special operations for the DEA.

Colombian heroin, which is white because it is more highly processed, is sold in the United States in purities ranging from 70 percent to 90 percent. Marshall said seizures of heroin from Mexico in 1991 averaged 15 percent purity.

Marshall said he believes "this operation has some significant implications, not just for law enforcement but for the country as a whole."

"This operation, I think, shows that heroin has re-emerged in our society with a vengeance, and it is more potent and more deadly in our country than ever before," said Marshall, speaking with Attorney General Janet Reno at the DEA's suburban Arlington, Virginia, headquarters.

The anti-drug sweep, called Operation Tar Pit, grew out of a June investigation that found a single organization was providing most of San Diego's high-grade heroin. Agents linked the ring to an investigation in Chimayo, New Mexico, where 85 people had died from heroin overdoses between 1995 and 1998, Marshall said.

"The higher purity actually allows users to smoke or inhale the heroin rather than injecting it, and unfortunately many people think that if it's not injected the heroin is not as dangerous," Marshall said, "and that couldn't be further from the truth as the sad and tragic events in Chimayo, New Mexico, will tell you."

The gang, based in the Nayarit state of Mexico, is believed to be led by Issas Hernandez-Garcia, who was arrested Thursday, and Angel Hernandez-Ibarra, who remains at large. Authorities believe the gang was distributing 80 pounds of heroin each month, worth more than dlrs 7 million, in 22 U.S. cities ranging from Anchorage, Alaska, to Columbus, Ohio.

To develop customers quickly, the distributors preyed on clinics where heroin addicts receive the drug methadone to block their need for heroin, Benson said.

"This organization operated in a dangerously efficient manner. Not only did this group exhibit disregard for the law, but their peddling of this powerful and addictive drug showed an even greater disregard for human life," Reno said.

Jose Antonio, a spokesman for the Mexican Embassy, said it was encouraging that U.S. authorities had broken up the ring but disputed characterizing the ring as Mexican. "The heroin is Mexican and the main heroin wholesalers were based in Nayarit, but the gang and the main distribution center was based in Los Angeles," he said.

DEA and FBI agents had arrested 70 people through Wednesday. On Thursday, they arrested 176 more people by early evening, searched 60 locations and seized 23 pounds (10 kilograms) of heroin. That brought overall seizures to 64 pounds (30 kilograms).