AURORA | State and federal officials on Friday announced that the state grand jury has indicted more than five dozen people for their suspected involvement in a sophisticated and far-flung drug ring with ties across Mexico and the Front Range, including Aurora.
Colorado Attorney General Phil Weiser joined several other agencies, including the local branch of the Drug Enforcement Administration and the 17th Judicial District Attorney’s office, in unveiling the investigation that began in late 2019 and resulted in hundreds of pounds of drugs and tens of thousands of pills being taken off the black market, according to a news release.
A superseding indictment filed Thursday levied 71 charges against some two dozen defendants, including multiple drug distribution, racketeering and conspiracy allegations, according to court documents. A total of 64 people have been implicated in the scheme since state jurors began returning their indictments on Oct. 22, 2019, according to Weiser’s office.
Prosecutors have alleged the defendants ferried vast amounts of cocaine, methamphetamine, heroin and fentanyl pills from Mexico to various pockets of the Front Range, including several locations in Aurora, using hidden compartments in multiple vehicles.
Authorities have accused two of the defendants, Jesus Alfredo Valdez-Leon and Jose Ignacio Valdez-Solis, of loading nearly 70 pounds of meth into a Chevrolet Cobalt at the Foxridge Farm trailer park off of East Colfax Avenue in far east Aurora on Aug. 27 last year. State troopers found the drugs in 25 individual packages after conducting a traffic stop on the vehicle shortly after it was loaded, according to court records.
A day later, investigators met with the accused leader of the criminal enterprise, Jose Roberto Moreno-Olivas — who has used the pseudonym Paul — at an Aurora hotel, where he confessed to distributing dozens of pounds of meth across the region. Authorities found another 20 pounds of the drug in his room at the Hyatt Place hotel on East 40th Avenue.
Moreno-Olivas was indicted on two dozen individual charges in the document returned Feb. 11, the most among the named defendants, according to the court record.
And just last month, agents seized thousands of grams of Oxycodone and hundreds of grams of heroin, meth and cocaine from several men living in unit 108 of 757 Dillon Way in Aurora.
Several members of the greater enterprise later used a series of wire transfers and trips to Mexico to launder the proceeds of the program, prosecutors have alleged.
In total, 77,000 counterfeit Oxycodone pills laced with the powerful opined fentanyl, 250 pounds of meth, 60 pounds of heroin, six kilograms of cocaine, 12 guns, several cars and nearly $1 million in cash were seized during the course of the probe, according to Weiser’s office.
Newly sworn-in Adams County District Attorney Brian Mason praised the efforts of the myriad agencies that investigated the criminal cells.
“Whenever we take drugs off of our streets, we make our community a safer place in which to live,” Mason said in a statement. “This impressive collaboration between law enforcement agencies is a true success story for making our entire community safer.
Police in Arvada, Aurora, Denver, Northglenn and several federal agencies took part in investigating the crime ring.
Weiser is helping prosecute the cases in the judicial districts in both Adams and Jefferson counties.