Police tracked one cellphone number they suspected was used by several people transporting fentanyl from California to Portland, leading to the stops of two cars, four arrests and the seizure of several bricks of the powdered drug branded with the usurped logo of the San Francisco 49ers, prosecutors say.
The first arrests came in January after Portland police obtained a warrant for the geolocation of a cellphone number used by someone nicknamed “Josh,” according to Assistant U.S. Attorney Cassady Adams.
The coordinates for the so-called “dispatcher” phone showed it near Holladay Park and then traveling south on Interstate 5 toward California.
On Jan. 28, police tracked the phone heading back up the freeway in Oregon and officers stopped a black Hyundai on Stark Street in Portland, Adams wrote in a sentencing memo.
They arrested Yesmin Banegas-Hernandez, 21, the driver, and Delver Antonio Sandrez-Cruz, 23, the front seat passenger.
A drug detection police dog alerted to the odor of narcotics coming from the back seat, where officers seized more than 3 kilograms of fentanyl powder, some hidden in a shoebox in the back seat, a bag on top of the shoe box and in the trunk, the memo said.
Among the drugs seized were bricks of fentanyl imprinted with various stamps, including the 49ers logo and a skull and crossbones with bunny ears, according to the affidavit.
Distributors sometimes stamp the drugs they sell to distinguish them from drugs sold by others, investigators said.
A month later, police discovered the same cellphone number still active and suspected it had been transferred to a new phone and was being used to sell drugs, according to Adams.
Investigators arrested Donovan Isael Hernandez-Barahona, 19, and Junior Osiel Palma-Cruz, 19, on Feb. 28 in Portland after police tracked a car from Oakland up I-5 into Oregon. Palma-Cruz was the driver and Hernandez-Barahona was a passenger in the car.
Using a police dog again, investigators found a plastic bag inside the car with about 2 kilograms of pressed bricks of powdered fentanyl imprinted with the 49ers logo, according to Adams.
They were wrapped in several layers of plastic, with cayenne pepper and grease, in an apparent attempt to mask their scent from detection, according to Assistant U.S. Attorney Cassady Adams.
Police also seized six cellphones, packaging material and a digital scale from the car.
Hernandez-Barahona was found with the “dispatcher” phone that federal investigators had been tracking, according to the prosecutor.
In separate hearings Tuesday, both Hernandez-Barahona and Banegas-Hernandez were sentenced to two years and three months in prison. Both are expected to be deported to Honduras after they serve their sentences.
Ernest Warren, Hernandez-Barahona’s lawyer, argued that his client was under threat when he distributed the drug but took responsibility and pleaded guilty to possession with intent to distribute fentanyl.
Hernandez-Barahona told U.S. District Judge Adrienne Nelson that he was working in a paint and auto body shop in California when “some people showed up wearing masks” and threatened him with weapons.” He said the masked men gave him a cellphone “and told me I have to go to Oregon.”
“They told me if I didn’t do it they were going to take my life and they were going to take my son’s life,” he said.
Banegas-Hernandez was sentenced separately by U.S. District Judge Michael H. Simon and apologized to the judge, saying “I didn’t know what a big mistake I was making.”
He said he has been in the United States for nine years, seeking asylum since he came from Honduras with his mother at age 12. He pleaded guilty to possessing with intent to distribute fentanyl.
Sandrez-Cruz , who was in the car with Banegas-Hernandez in January, was sentenced last month to the same sentence of two years and three months sentence for possessing with intent to distribute fentanyl.
Palma-Cruz has pleaded guilty to possessing with intent to distribute fentanyl and is awaiting sentencing.
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