[L]aw enforcement officials seized 88 pounds of heroin in southern Vermont this month and arrested a Guatemalan man who had arrived in New York just days earlier, court documents show.
Customs and Border Protection officers in Miami intercepted a package destined for Vermont with the massive quantity of heroin in two packages labeled “Incaparina,” a food supplement made from flour and soy.
The heroin has a street value of “significantly more” than $5 million and could fill more than 1 million individual dosage bags, according to Special Agent Christopher Pandolfi of the Department of Homeland Security.
Officers arrested Diego Walther Anibal Mejia Paredes of Guatemala, who is charged with possession of a kilogram or more of a controlled substance with intent to distribute. Based on the amount of heroin involved, Paredes faces a minimum sentence of 10 years in prison and a maximum sentence of life in prison.
Paredes, 33, is being held at the Northwest State Correctional Facility in St. Albans, according to the Burlington Free Press, which first reported the incident. Paredes is being held because a judge determined there were no conditions under which, if released, he would not be a flight risk. Steven Barth, of the Public Defender’s Office, is representing Paredes. Barth agreed not to press for his client’s release at this time, court records show.
U.S. Attorney Eric Miller said he was unable to comment on the case because it involves an ongoing investigation, but he praised the cooperation between state, local and federal law enforcement. Homeland Security Investigations, the Drug Enforcement Administration and the State Police Drug Task Force worked together to make the seizure and arrest.
The seizure is the largest in Vermont this year, based on a review of 16 news releases involving the possession and distribution of heroin issued by the U.S. Attorney’s office in 2015. The next largest heroin seizure publicized by the office involved 20,000 bags, a fraction of what was seized in the Paredes case.
Customs and Border Protection sent the packages to Homeland Security Investigations in Burlington, which arranged for a “controlled delivery” to its destination.
The shipment was sent to a “Jose Medina,” which officers suspect to be a fake name. It carried the address of the Cilantro restaurant in Manchester Center. Officers delivered the package Oct. 8 and arrested Paredes shortly after he accepted the delivery.
Officers saw Paredes waiting outside the restaurant in a silver Audi A6. Paredes provided identification and placed the packages in the car, telling the deliveryman that Jose Medina was his cousin. The packages never entered the restaurant, court records show.
Paredes was “hyper-vigilant” as he drove away, constantly checking his rearview mirror, court records say. He took “counter-surveillance” measures, Pandolfi wrote in court documents, at one point taking three right turns and almost returning to his starting point.
Law enforcement confirmed that Paredes is a Guatemalan national who entered the U.S. on a visitors visa at JFK International in New York on Oct. 5 — the same day the packages were shipped from Guatemala, according to court documents.
Once arrested, Paredes told officers he had no cousin named Jose Medina. He initially said he did not know what was in the packages, but later said they contained the food supplement Incaparina. Paredes said he was not aware that the packages contained drugs.
He told officers that he was instructed to use one of two cellphones in his possession to text a Blackberry phone number belonging to someone in Guatemala who Paredes identified only as “Jose.” Paredes said he was told Jose would then send someone to pick up the packages.
The seizure is notable not only for the amount, but also its provenance. In the releases issued by the U.S. Attorney in 2015 involving heroin distribution, the people arrested, charged or convicted were overwhelmingly from New Jersey and New York, especially Brooklyn and the Bronx.
The recent conviction of a Dominican man with ties to Mexican drug cartels involved drugs being shipped from border towns in Arizona to New Hampshire for distribution in New England. One other instance involved a man from Trinidad and Tobago, but otherwise none of the arrests covered by news releases involve foreign nationals. There were no other cases that involved a large amount of heroin being shipped directly to Vermont from outside the U.S.
Jon DeLena, DEA assistant special agent in charge for the Manchester District Office, which covers New Hampshire, Vermont and Maine, said he could not comment specifically on the seizure in Manchester Center.
“Nothing should come as a surprise to us. We have a very serious opioid addiction crisis here in New England, and because of that, the (drug) cartels are working hard every day to bring drugs into the region,” DeLena said.
DeLena also praised the collaborative effort among state, federal and local law enforcement agencies, which he said has resulted in recent drug enforcement successes in the region.
