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Tag: busted

  • Meth Shipment Was Disguised As Aztec Artifacts

    Meth Shipment Was Disguised As Aztec Artifacts

    A drug ring attempted to ship nearly 12 kilograms of meth to Hawaii disguised as decorative Aztec items.

    At first glance, they might have appeared to be ancient artifacts, or at least cheesy souvenir imitations, but a shipment of Aztec-style statues and calendars actually contained pure methamphetamine bound for Hawaii, federal officials say. 

    On Oct. 15, agents from Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) arrested eight people around Los Angeles, alleging they were involved in a drug ring that attempted to ship nearly 12 kilograms of meth to Hawaii disguised as decorative Aztec items. Officials say these were part of a “nearly 90-pound shipment that appeared to be colorful, decorative Mexican items, including replicas of the 500-year-old Aztec calendar stone.”

    A ninth suspect was already in federal custody on unrelated charges. 

    “Methamphetamine—no matter how it’s packaged—is a powerful drug that devastates our communities,” Mark Zito, assistant special agent in charge for HSI Los Angeles said in a press release. “HSI will continue to closely collaborate with our federal, state and local law enforcement partners to keep this dangerous contraband from reaching our streets.”

    Over the course of the last year, members of the ring have sent other meth shipments to Hawaii, the feds said. 

    The individuals named on the federal indictment in the case are Felix Salgado, 28, of Perris, who allegedly bought wholesale quantities of meth for the conspiracy; Vaimanino Lee Pomele, 49, of Garden Grove, who allegedly orchestrated the shipments to Hawaii and his wife, Alejandra Pomele, 44, who allegedly delivered narcotics; and six others.

    Recently meth seizures have been on the rise, fueled by Mexican cartels pushing the drug. 

    “They came in with much purer, much cheaper meth and just flooded this region of the country,” Richard Salter, a Drug Enforcement Administration agent with 27 years of experience, told KITV in September.  

    U.S. Customs and Border Protection has seen a 50% increase in the amount of meth seized compared to this time last year, according to Anne Maricich, deputy director of field operations for the agency’s San Diego ports of entry.

    “The other hard narcotics like cocaine, heroin and fentanyl, we see them—they’re prevalent at our border crossings, but nowhere near the quantities that we see of meth,” she said.

    View the original article at thefix.com

  • Gang Accidentally Filmed Themselves Prepping Drone Drug Drop

    Gang Accidentally Filmed Themselves Prepping Drone Drug Drop

    During an attempt to smuggle drugs into prison, Scottish gang members managed to give police ample evidence to lock them up.

    The Scottish gang members who accidentally filmed themselves loading up drugs on a prison-bound drone are now bound for prison themselves. 

    Paul Reilly and Michael Martin were hit with nearly four years in the hoosegow following their ill-fated flight, according to The Scotsman.

    The duo was aiming to send the drugs over the walls and into Perth Prison, where Martin’s brother was expecting to reel in the pills and pot, according to the New York Post.

    But, while packing the narcotics onto the remote flyer, Martin accidentally turned on the drone’s camera and recorded more than 18 minutes of footage of him and his gang prepping the drug load.

    “If there was an award for the movie with the most inept director,” prosecutor Michael Sweeney said, “then it would have been won by the accused.”

    The footage showed both men—along with a third still-unidentified suspect—neatly packing Kinder Eggs full of drugs to send into the prison. Though the video even managed to show the gang’s house number, the criminal crew turned out to be better at filming than they were at flying, as the drone was eventually found crashed outside the prison yard.  

    When they recovered the wrecked flyer, authorities found a micro SD card full of the incriminating evidence. 

    “I don’t think they were aware the drone was actually filming at that time. I’m assuming he was looking at the drone to check if it was on, if it was functioning,” PC Nicholas Schembri said in court. “He was maybe making sure it was properly set-up. From the footage I viewed you could see clearly a tattoo on his neck.”

    The crew tried to exercise some element of caution, covering their hands with gloves to shield their fingerprints and DNA from the drone—but that turned out to be a futile precaution.

    That arrest came just months after authorities in the UK collared another set of gang members accused of making dozens of drone flights into prisons. In that case, it was an outdoor wildlife camera that tipped off police to the illicit flying operation and landed eight people behind bars. 

    View the original article at thefix.com

  • Woman Caught Trying To Smuggle Cocaine In Heels For Online Charmer

    Woman Caught Trying To Smuggle Cocaine In Heels For Online Charmer

    The woman believed she was just smuggling artifacts for a promising love interest. 

    Before a charlatan offering an internet romance lured her into smuggling 2 kilograms of cocaine in her gold high heels, Denise Marie Woodrum once dreamed of becoming a nun. 

    But after crippling medical debt, a difficult surgery, a tough divorce, the loss of her job and a long battle with depression, the Missouri woman’s devout faith alone wasn’t enough to get her through.

    Maybe, she thought, her new lover—a mysterious online charmer known as Hendrik Cornelius—was. 

    Instead, the short-lived internet romance with the mystery Lothario she never actually met landed Woodrum in an Australian prison. She was reportedly sentenced last week to 7.5 years behind bars for her role in the smuggling scheme, a baffling illicit plot she claimed she knew nothing about. 

    “There are fraudsters out there who are relying on women who are vulnerable,” said her lawyer, Rebecca Neil, according to the Sydney Morning Herald. “She was groomed to provide a financial gain for this person, Hendrik Cornelius, whatever person or persons it was behind this identity.”

    The series of personal dramas that ended in the Aussie hoosegow started years earlier in California. Woodrum had been living with her husband and working as a grade school teacher when her marriage collapsed, according to the Washington Post.

    She moved to Montana and into her father’s condo, but her life continued on a downward slide until she found herself saddled with medical debt and selling vitamins at the mall.

    Then in the spring of 2017, she finally saw hope, a desperate grasp at something new that played out over the course of hundreds of text messages.

    “Can you promise you will never leave me?” Woodrum wrote in a message, according to the Sydney paper. “You are my Only and First True Family!!!” 

    It may have seemed that way at the time, but when Woodrum found herself at the airport with a key of coke and some hard questions to answer, Cornelius was nowhere to be found. 

    The then-50-year-old started her ill-fated smuggling run in Missouri, then flew to Texas, then Trindad and Tobago, then Suriname. Then, she hopped back to Trinidad and Tobago, then Miami, then Los Angeles and finally Sydney. 

    But when she touched down in the harbor city, her bags were flagged for additional inspection—and a swab test and X-rays found a heel full of blow.

    “How much did they put in the shoes?” Woodrum allegedly asked while the felonious footwear went through the scanner. “Sorry, just talking to myself,” she added. 

    Despite that muttered question, Woodrum consistently told the courts she’d been duped, and that she thought she was just bringing artifacts for the man she’d never met.

    District Court Judge Penelope Wass didn’t buy it, deeming her story “at times unbelievable” and noting the apparent lack of contrition.

    “I am being asked to accept that unknown to the offender the relationship was not genuine and created by the internet to dupe the offender,” Wass said, according to BuzzFeed. “There is a limit to which even her own expressions show she is genuinely remorseful for her conduct, rather than the position she now finds herself in.”

    And so, on Thursday, the New South Wales District Court sentenced Woodrum to a maximum of 7.5 years in the pen. She’ll be eligible for parole in 2022.

    View the original article at thefix.com

  • McDonald’s Receipt Foils Detective's Drug Money Scheme

    McDonald’s Receipt Foils Detective's Drug Money Scheme

    The disgraced detective stole $40,000 in drug money that was waiting to be intercepted by a drug task force.

    A Louisville detective outed himself as a crooked cop with one critical error—paying for a $5 McDonald’s meal by credit card around the same time he lifted $40,000 of drug evidence.

    Detective Kyle Willett—a veteran of Louisville Metro Police who at the time was working at a UPS shipping hub as part of a task force to intercept drug activity in Louisville, Kentucky—stopped for a sweet tea and cheeseburger at McDonald’s and paid for the $4.76 meal with his credit card.

    Then, he went to work, illegally searched a package, and stole its contents—$40,000 in cash. Little did he know, a West Coast drug task force was waiting in Oakland, California for the same package to arrive, hoping to intercept the $40,000 of evidence that would help nab a drug trafficker.

    But the package wasn’t entirely empty. It didn’t contain the money, but it did contain some damning evidence that would lead authorities to Willett—the discarded bag that his McDonald’s meal came in, which he had for some reason stuffed inside the emptied package, receipt and all.

    Authorities were able to identify Willett via the last four digits of his credit card number from the receipt, and his white Tahoe was identified via surveillance footage in the McDonald’s parking lot at the time printed on the receipt.

    Authorities began investigating Willett and caught him the next time he stole cash from a package.

    The investigation affected not only Willett, but his entire task force. Upon scrutinizing the task force’s activity during the Willett investigation, authorities noticed that task force members were illegally searching packages without warrants, in their vehicles, or alone. And if they did found evidence, they would re-seal the package and request a search warrant, according to the Courier–Journal.

    Though it is a clear constitutional violation, according to legal experts, then-U.S. Attorney for the Western District of Kentucky John Kuhn decided to prosecute only Willett and not the other members of the task force.

    However, the decision was made to “clean house completely” within the task force to flush out any “systemic issues,” and every member has since been replaced.

    Willett resigned in October 2016 and pleaded guilty in federal court to theft from interstate shipment (a felony) for stealing more than $74,000 between January and August 2016.

    According to the Courier-Journal, most of the stolen cash was found in his home and car.

    Willett has already served five months in federal prison and five months of home detention. He remains on supervised probation for two years and is barred from owning a firearm.

    View the original article at thefix.com