U.S. Attorney Nick Brown flanked by federal and local law enforcement leaders for the bust announcement at the Tacoma Federal Courthouse
A major drug trafficking ring with links to a white supremacist prison gang is now busted.
U.S. Attorney, Nick Brown, was joined by law enforcement leaders, including the FBI, DEA and Homeland Security Investigation Special Agents In Charge, to announce the indictments of 27 people linked to the drug ring, working in Washington and Arizona, many of them members of white power groups tied to the Aryan Family gang found in Washington’s prisons.
After months of investigation and surveillance, multiple agencies made the arrests last week and seized nearly 2-million doses of fentanyl, more than 230 pounds of meth – some made in Mexico and delivered to Washington through multiple methods, including the U.S. Mail, with some of the drugs made right here. Brown says they were involved in some “incredibly dangerous behavior”. “They had pill presses, making their own potentially deadly fentanyl pills,” Brown said, “They continued their involvement in this operation even though, at various times during the course of the wire tap, law enforcement officers used court-authorized warrants to secretly seize their stashes.” Brown says they even reported some of the lost drugs to law enforcement as thefts, which he described as ‘audacious’.
The more than 350 law enforcement officers involved in the sweep also seized more than 225 guns, many of them high-powered rifles. Brown says as the group’s partner, the infamous Sinaloa drug cartel, sent drugs up to Washington, the gang sent guns to the cartel, which he says are being used to kill people every single day.
Many of those charged made their first Federal Court appearances in this case Monday.
While most of them are in custody, there are still a few on the loose.