Law enforcement agencies seized 50 pounds of methamphetamine in an operation Wednesday.
Lewis County Sheriff's Deputy Rick Van Wyck and K9 partner Axel pose next to the 50 pounds of methamphetamine they helped seize Wednesday.
In the third large methamphetamine bust on Interstate 5 in Lewis County in two weeks, officers seized 50 pounds of the drug packed in a box truck Wednesday near Napavine, according to a news release from the Joint Narcotics Enforcement Team.
One suspect, identified as Antonio D. Beltran-Villanueva, 25, of Portland, Oregon, was arrested and booked into the Lewis County Jail at 10 a.m. Wednesday on suspicion of possession of methamphetamine with intent to deliver, according to the jail records.
According to a news release, local investigators working with law enforcement from Oregon and Homeland Security Investigations conducted a traffic stop Wednesday on a green Chevrolet truck with Oregon license plates near Napavine on I-5.
The driver, Beltran-Villanueva, did not have a valid driver’s license. Lewis County Sheriff’s Deputy Rick Van Wyck and K9 partner Axel, who is trained to detect narcotics responded and Axel alerted to the presence of drugs.
Officers searched the truck and reportedly found one pound of methamphetamine under the driver’s seat and an additional 44 bundles of the drug in the box of the truck. A total of 50 pounds of meth was seized.
JNET, a partnership between the Centralia and Chehalis Police Departments, the Lewis County Sheriff’s Office and the Washington state Department of Corrections.
This is the third major meth bust in the past few weeks.
On April 26, JNET officers stopped a semi truck traveling through Lewis County on Interstate 5 and found 126 pounds of methamphetamine and thousands of Oxycodone pills. Two suspects — Carlos Alejandro Luna-Rodriguez, 22, of Mexicali, Mexico and Bernardo Olivas-Leyva, 62, of Fontana, California — were arrested and charged with felony drug crimes
Then on May 3, JNET contacted three occupants of two vehicles at a parking lot off I-5 in Chehalis, eventually seizing 23 pounds of methamphetamine and more than two pounds of heroin.
In that case, Juan Fernando Campos-Campos, 29, of Vancouver, Washington, Manuel Rojas-Valdez, 22, of Rialto, California and Jose Luis Felix-Gonzalez, 52, of Stone Park, Illinois, have all been charged with possession of methamphetamine with intent to deliver.
