Federal and local authorities on Thursday afternoon announced a major drug bust in which agents seized 86 pounds of heroin — a drug that agents said is rapidly increasing in popularity.
Authorities said the raid dismantled a Mexican drug trafficking organization operating locally. The investigation involved the Fulton County District Attorney's Office and the federal Drug Enforcement Administration.
Harry S. Sommers, special agent in charge of the Atlanta field office of the DEA, said Wednesday's raid was a followup to a bust a year ago in which nearly that much heroin — 77 pounds — was confiscated from the same drug organization.
Sommers said that the investigation led agents to a "known drug stash house" in the Duluth area, where 86 pounds of heroin, with a street value of $5 million, was found inside cavities behind the dry wall. Agents also seized an AR-15 assault rifle and a .45-caliber handgun, 4.4 pounds of crystal methamphetamine with a street value of $132,000, and $50,000 in cash.
Three men were arrested: Bardomiano Renteria-Salazar, 36, Carlos Soto-Pineda, 32, and Raphael Lee-Ochoa, 21. Two of the suspects are Mexican nationals, but authorities did not say which two. All three are being held in the Gwinnett County Detention Center.
"We did a second search of a known money stash house that was also in the Atlanta metropolitan area, and at that search, we seized approximately $2 million in U.S. currency," Sommers said. He would not say specifically where that house was located because of the ongoing investigation.
"Altogether, it was an unprecedented seizure of heroin and money in this community, and it's clearly an indicator of the growing issue." Sommers said.
He said that heroin use in metro Atlanta and elsewhere has increased significantly in recent years as the purity of the heroin being smuggled into the country from Mexico has increased.
The increased purity, Sommers said, has allowed for easier methods of getting the drug into the bloodstream. While once most heroin users injected the drug into their veins, abusers are now able to smoke and snort the drug, he said.
"Heroin delivery methods changed drastically," Sommers said. "It wasn't that many years ago that a street level heroin purchase would have been 10 percent or less in purity. Now, a street level heroin purchase is frequently 50 percent or greater in pure heroin."
"Purity level has allowed them to either smoke it or snort it," he said. "It's taken away a little of the stigma that you might have had with heroin in the past. You take the delivery method to be a smokable or snortable drug, and in [the user's] mind, it becomes a recreational drug."
Now, Sommers said, heroin is a "much more inexpensive" drug than pharmaceuticals such as Oxycontin, with a similar outcome.
"Heroin is being marketed to pain medication abusers as a cheaper alternative that is almost structurally the same and affects the body almost exactly the same," Sommers said.
Staff writer Fran Jeffries contributed to this article.
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