Thread: Mexican cartels using R.I. sites as outposts

Mexican cartels using R.I. sites as outposts

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01:00 AM EDT on Sunday, July 10, 2011

By Katie Mulvaney

Journal Staff Writer

NORTH KINGSTOWN

The men visited the storage unit just three times from November to January, driving a 2005 Toyota minivan and a Chrysler Pacifica.

Occasionally, a tractor-trailer truck would come to the space, one of dozens in the commerce park that’s home to design shops, a construction company, even a van line. Their infrequent trips drew little notice on the tree-lined road leading to the complex and traveled by moving vans, cars loaded with children, and tractors making their way to and from Schartner Farms, just around the bend.

They got no second glances from neighbors, who were used to people of all sorts visiting the complex on Dry Bridge Road. That’s what the men wanted. As players in a Mexican drug cartel, authorities say, the men wanted to blend in, a strategy the cartels have used as they strengthen their hold on the Northeast, replacing Colombians as the major drug traffickers in the region.

A tip about cocaine being shipped by tractor-trailer into Rhode Island from the West Coast led state police and drug enforcement agents to 376 Dry Bridge Road, Unit A-3, in the 9-acre commerce park, court documents show.

The police arrested Rodrigo Armando Saucedo and Andrew Rios, both of California, and Adilson A. Reyes, a truck driver from Utah, on drug trafficking charges after a raid in late January. Authorities say they seized 143 pounds of cocaine, worth an estimated $6.6 million on the street, and more than $1.2 million in cash hidden in intricate secret compartments in vehicles.

Reyes pleaded guilty to conspiracy in April. He has cooperated with investigators, telling them that he worked for Saucedo transporting cocaine across the country throughout the past year for up to $6,000 a load, court records show. Saucedo and Rios have pleaded not guilty to the charges.

Artin H. Coloian, who represents Saucedo, said he can’t speak to the activities of Mexican drug cartels.

“That’s a moniker placed on them by the government with no reliable basis,â€

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