A man with alleged ties to the Sinaloa Cartel was arrested and almost 45 pounds of a fentanyl and cocaine mixture were seized by federal authorities during an operation in a Denver suburb.
The Drug Enforcement Administration said Monday that Alberto Reyes-Carrillo was arrested last week with the help of Homeland Security Investigations and the Longmont police.
Mr. Reyes Carrillo is being held on a $500,000 bond in Boulder County.
“Fentanyl-related deaths rose over 70% in Colorado during 2021 and it isn’t slowing down,” Ryan L. Spradlin, special agent in charge for HSI Denver, said in a release. “This poison that transnational criminal organizations increasingly smuggle into the United States is responsible for over 100,000 deaths nationwide while putting millions of dollars in the pockets of drug cartels.”
DEA officials have said that the Sinaloa and the Jalisco cartels in Mexico are primary distributors of fentanyl throughout the U.S.
The powerful synthetic opioid is responsible for two-thirds of the 107,000 fatal drug poisonings in 2021, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Both cartels typically get chemicals from China to make fentanyl, which is 50 times more potent than heroin and 100 times more potent than morphine.
• Matt Delaney can be reached at mdelaney@washingtontimes.com.
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