Feds take down drug traffickers

A San Mateo man was one of several arrested Wednesday in the dismantling of a West Coast drug trafficking ring carried out by the Drug Enforcement Administration.

Police arrested 28 people in the Bay Area and Seattle during Wednesday’s multiple raids and are still looking for another 15 people in connection with a continuing criminal enterprise that dealt cocaine and methamphetamine.

The operation, called "Honduran Highway,” was the result of a four-year investigation by the DEA, Internal Revenue Service and the San Francisco and Oakland police departments.

Wednesday morning, DEA agents alongside San Mateo County Narcotics Task Force officers descended on a home at 1423 Alameda de las Pulgas in the Homestead neighborhood of San Mateo at about 6 a.m. to search the home of a man listed in a federal grand jury indictment.

A neighbor and witness to Wednesday’s raid in San Mateo said police brought several people dressed in pajamas, described as teens or children, out of the house, along with several bags of evidence before putting at least one person in handcuffs.

The San Mateo man arrested in the raid was Fortunato Rodelo-Lara, 42, according to a statement by U.S. Attorney Melinda Haag.

Rodelo-Lara has been arraigned in federal court in San Francisco and faces a detention hearing next week.

The indictment alleges a narcotics conspiracy and the defendants face 40 years to life in prison and fines ranging from $2 million to $4 million.

Seven people were arrested locally in San Francisco, Hayward, Vallejo, San Mateo and San Jose in Wednesday’s raids and another 20 were arrested in Seattle, according to Haag’s statement.

The charges range from conspiracy to distribute and to possess with intent to distribute cocaine, cocaine base and methamphetamine and operating a continuing criminal enterprise.

The alleged ringleaders of the operation are Antonio Jose Diaz-Rivera and Jose Angel Monroy, according to Haag’s statement. They are alleged to have committed a series of drug-trafficking crimes while working in concert with at least five other people whom they organized, supervised or managed, and by obtaining substantial income and resources from the enterprise, according to the indictment.

Two other defendants named in the indictment are also being charged with wire fraud and conspiracy to commit wire fraud.

A federal grand jury in San Francisco indicted 20 defendants Jan. 17 for drug-related charges that include conspiracy to distribute 5 kilograms or more of cocaine; 280 grams or more of cocaine base; and 500 grams or more of methamphetamine. The indictment was unsealed Wednesday.

Bill Silverfarb can be reached by email: silverfarb@smdailyjournal.com or by phone: (650) 344-5200 ext. 106.