Mexican National - Drug trafficker who brought heroin into Tampa gets 27 years in fed
Drug trafficker who brought heroin into Tampa gets 27 years in federal prison
Felix Mejia Lagunas, 42, was sentened Tuesday to 27 years in prison for his role in a drug trafficking organization that brought massive amounts of heroin into Tampa and Orlando. [Pinellas County Sheriff's Office]
Dan Sullivan
Published: December 19, 2017
Updated: December 19, 2017 at 08:50 PM
TAMPA — A Mexican national described as a leader in a drug trafficking organization that brought massive shipments of heroin into the Tampa Bay area was sentenced Tuesday to 27 years in federal prison.
Felix Mejia Lagunas, 42, was at the top of a U.S. supply chain that guided at least 66 pounds of the drug onto the streets of Tampa, St. Petersburg and Orlando, federal prosecutors said.
All three cities have felt the sting of heroin in recent years, a drug whose skyrocketing use is part of a national epidemic. In 2016, heroin killed 52 people in Hillsborough County. It killed 35 a year before that and 22 the year before that.
Lagunas, who lived in California when he was arrested in March, directed drug shipments to distributors in Orlando, who then passed it to street-level dealers, federal authorities said. Along the way, handlers would add cutting agents like fentanyl, a powerful painkiller widely blamed for overdose deaths.
In a Tampa courtroom Tuesday, defense attorney Roger Futerman downplayed Lagunas’ involvement. He pointed to other men who received the drugs, arguing their conduct was more egregious.
U.S. District Judge Susan Bucklew wasn’t buying it.
"Do you know how many people were users as a result of the heroin your client brought into the U.S.?" Bucklew asked. "Do you know how many lives he’s ruined?"
The arrest and prosecution of Lagunas capped a two-year investigation that had its origins in the Tampa Police Department’s efforts to combat violent street gangs.
The Safe Streets Task Force, a collaboration between FBI agents and local law enforcement, began targeting suspected members of the Latin Kings gang in Tampa in 2015, said Lester Gonzalez, a task force officer with Tampa police.
They began with hand-to-hand undercover drug purchases and, over time, graduated to sophisticated wire-tap surveillance of major distributors.
"We just started from street-level buys and worked our way up," Gonzalez said.
The U.S. Attorney’s Office detailed an intricate drug distribution network that included at least eight Tampa and St. Petersburg residents who moved and sold heroin.
At the top of the stack was Lagunas. Prosecutors said he oversaw the importation of Mexican heroin from his home in California.
"Domestically, there is no one higher than him because he is the source of supply," said Assistant U.S. Attorney Carlton Gammons. The only people who rank higher in the organization live in Mexico, he said.
In January, investigators seized a package of heroin that Lagunas mailed to an Orlando man, Jesus Bermudez Caraballo.
Caraballo gave portions of heroin shipments to three other men, who disbursed it in the Orlando area.
A fourth man, Angel Alexis Alicea, would take the remaining drugs to three local distributors in the Tampa Bay area. Those people packaged and sold it to four street dealers, authorities said.
Each person who touched the heroin mixed in other substances, like fentanyl, said Tony Vargas, a special agent with the FBI.
In March, investigators executed search warrants on homes, storage units and other locations. They revealed what prosecutors said was a snapshot of the organization’s daily product distribution: 6.5 grams of heroin, $600,000 in cash and nine guns.
In court, Gammons estimated the group was responsible for moving about 15 kilograms — or 33 pounds — of heroin per month.
Lagunas and Caraballo were indicted along with another man, Jose Polanco Vazquez.
Caraballo and Vazquez received 11 and 12 years in prison, respectively. A total of 10 other people were also convicted and given sentences that ranged from two to 21 years in prison.
In court Tuesday, Lagunas stood before the judge in orange jail scrubs, his voice shaking as he spoke through a Spanish translator.
"What can I say?" he said. "I can say that I’m sorry for all of you here present, to the state of Florida, to the people I harmed. .?.?. I’m remorseful for having done wrong things."
In a plea agreement, he admitted being a "leader and organizer."
But despite that, his lawyer argued he was little more than a "middle man" who simply obtained heroin for people who were interested in buying it.
A sentencing memo described Lagunas’ poverty-stricken life in Mexico — the reason he came to the United States illegally. He had served time in prison previously. When he was released in 2010, he was deported but later returned.
The proceeds of his drug activity supported a modest lifestyle, Futerman wrote in the sentencing memo. Lagunas used the money to support his wife, their two daughters and extended family in Mexico.
"He’s not the person they say he is," his wife, Maritza Cabrera, said at the sentencing. "He comes from a very close family. .?.?. For us, this is very hard."
Investigation leads to 8 local convictions
An investigation of a major heroin trafficking organization has led to federal criminal convictions and prison sentences against 13 people, including eight Tampa Bay area residents. Those eight, and their sentences, were:
• Jose Leonardo Jimenez, 29, of Tampa; 21 years
• Freddie Resto, 59, of Tampa; 11 years
• Angel Alexis Alicea, 29, of Tampa; 10 years
• Jose Angel Jimenez Villa, 27, of Tampa; 10 years
• Jose Antonio Crespo Negron, 30, of Tampa; 10 years,
• Juan Carlos Lopez, 34, of Tampa; seven years
• Robert Kelly, 56, of Tampa; four years
• Rachel Augustine Thomas, 56, of St. Petersburg; two years
Source: U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Middle District of Florida
http://www.tampabay.com/news/courts/...ison_163745287
