Feds bust California drug ring
Iraqis, Mexican cartel also had arms, police say
SAN DIEGO – Federal officials said Thursday they’ve busted a drug trafficking ring involving Mexico’s most powerful cartel and members of an Iraqi immigrant community in the U.S. who were caught selling illegal drugs, assault rifles, grenades and homemade explosives.
About 60 people from the Iraqi community were arrested after a six-month investigation carried out by the Drug Enforcement Administration and police in the city of El Cajon, a working-class city east of San Diego.
Many of the suspects are Iraqi Chaldeans – Christians who fled their homeland amid threats from al-Qaida and other extremists. Police say at least some of those arrested are suspected of being affiliated with the Chaldean Organized Crime Syndicate, an Iraqi gang based in Detroit.
Authorities say the suspects were working out of an Iraqi social club in El Cajon and shipping drugs supplied by Mexico’s powerful Sinaloa cartel to Detroit, home to the largest Chaldean population in the United States, according to the federal indictment unsealed Thursday. El Cajon has the second largest Chaldean population.
Officials were tipped off after neighbors and even some of the club members’ spouses complained for years about the establishment’s criminal activity, which has included attempted murder, sales of meth and marijuana, gambling and illegal firearms sales.
Authorities seized 18 pounds of methamphetamine, narcotics, cocaine and other drugs; more than 3,500 pounds of marijuana; $630,000 in cash; four IEDs; and more than 30 guns, including assault rifles.
Officials believe the weapons and explosives were meant to be sold locally and there were no indications the group was supplying Mexico’s most violent cartel with weapons for use in that country’s drug war, which has claimed at least 35,000 lives.
William R. Sherman, acting special agent in charge in the DEA’s San Diego division, said the ring was going to sell a portion of the 3,500 pounds of marijuana, believed to belong to the Sinaloa cartel led by Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman, who has become one of the world’s richest and most-wanted men since he escaped from a Mexican prison 10 years ago.
Over the past two decades, Mexican migrant smugglers helped many of the Chaldeans reach the United States. The descendants of the ancient inhabitants of Mesopotamia – what is now Iraq – fled their homeland to escape persecution for their Christianity. Hundreds passed through Tijuana on their way to California.
About half of the 60 arrested face federal charges and half face state charges. Some are also illegal immigrants but officials declined to say whether they will be deported.