Tucson Region
One ton of marijuana seized
Dump truck alerts cops to shop near I-10
By Philip Haldiman
the arizona daily star
Tucson, Arizona | Published: 06.17.2008
A dump truck dropping dirt and decomposed granite at the rear of a North Side auto repair shop raised the suspicions of police officers doing surveillance Monday morning.
After obtaining a search warrant, a ton of marijuana was found bundled and hidden under tarps at the business, Precision Engineering, in the 800 block of West Grant Road, said Lt. Kelly Lane of the Counter Narcotics Alliance.
Tucson police believe the marijuana was in the landscaping material dumped at the business, Lane said.
Precision Engineering owner John Karl Kaufmann, Augustine Echeverria-Romero and Felencio Avila were arrested on charges of unlawful possession of marijuana for sale and conspiracy to sell marijuana.
Kaufmann was arrested on an additional charge of unlawful possession of a narcotic drug. Police seized cocaine from his home, said Sgt. Mark Robinson, a police spokes- man.
Echeverria-Romero and Avila were arrested at Precision Engineering. It was unclear whether they were employees of the business.
The marijuana is worth about $1 million, Lane said.
The material in the dump truck was found to be decomposed granite, the same kind of material that surrounds Precision Engineering, Robinson said. He said this might indicate that Monday's load was not the first dropped off on the property.
Robinson said officers doing surveillance in the area thought it was suspicious that such large amounts of landscaping material were being dumped at an auto repair shop.
Officers said the neighborhood had been under surveillance for several months because they believed the area was a common drop spot for drugs.
Precision Engineering is on a busy strip of Grant not far from the Tucson Police Department's West Side substation.
Lane said Precision Engineering has been at that location for many years and that the business's accessibility to the freeway, only minutes from Interstate 10, may have been one of the reasons that it was chosen as a stopping place for the drugs.
Lane said Kaufmann is often on the premises, and authorities believe it's unlikely he would not have known about the delivery.
Investigators will now focus on the business's financial records, the parties involved, how long it may have been going on, and the source and destination of the drugs.








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