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GoogleOperation Buckshot was a multi-agency investigation into a large-scale drug-trafficking conspiracy that involved the distribution of methamphetamine from California through Kansas City, Mo., and into southwest Missouri. That successful investigation resulted in the seizure of more than 38 pounds of methamphetamine, in excess of $100,000, four vehicles and 89 firearms, along with more than 1,000 rounds of ammunition and blasting caps. Numerous federal, state and local law enforcement agencies in both Missouri and Kansas participated in Operation Buckshot.
Michael L. Wilson, 32, of Lamar, Mo., was sentenced by U.S. District Judge Ortrie D. Smith to 15 years in federal prison without parole. Wilson has previously forfeited to the government $42,380 that was seized by law enforcement officers -- a 1969 Chevrolet Camaro and a 2000 Ford Mustang, which were used to commit the offense.
Moises Medina, 50, of Pueblo, Colo., was sentenced to 21 months (time served) in federal prison.
Wilson and Medina each pleaded guilty on Oct. 8, 2008, to their roles in a conspiracy to distribute methamphetamine in Barton County and elsewhere from December 2005 to Aug. 31, 2007. Medina also pleaded guilty to possession with the intent to distribute in excess of 500 grams of methamphetamine.
Wilson admitted that he received multi-pound deliveries of methamphetamine from suppliers based in California. Those suppliers used couriers to transport the methamphetamine to Kansas City or occasionally to Lamar. Wilson then distributed the methamphetamine to his distributors in western Missouri and eastern Kansas. Law enforcement officers executed a search warrant at Wilson's residence on July 11, 2007, seizing approximately three kilograms of methamphetamine, $37,880 and two vehicles that were used to facilitate the conspiracy.
Medina admitted that he drove a Chevrolet Trailblazer, carrying more than 11 kilograms of methamphetamine, from Colorado to Kansas City, Kan., in August 2007.
Police officers discovered 26 individually wrapped packages containing 11.62 kilograms (approximately 25 pounds) of methamphetamine in a hidden compartment of the vehicle.
Three co-defendants who earlier pleaded guilty to their roles in the drug-trafficking conspiracy were sentenced on Thursday, May 21, 2009. Harold Heath Foster, 35, of Lamar, was sentenced to 11 years and eight months in federal prison without parole. David C. Paniagua, 39, of Highland, Calif., was sentenced to six years and eight months in federal prison without parole.
Ronald L. Hampton, 38, of Liberal, Mo., was sentenced to 20 months (time served) in federal prison.
The court also ordered Hampton to forfeit to the government 24 firearms that were used to commit the offenses along with $6,729, which represents proceeds from the conspiracy.
Foster admitted that he was supplied methamphetamine by Wilson. He primarily received the methamphetamine from Wilson on a "front," meaning on consignment, and paid for it after he had distributed the methamphetamine to others. The amount of methamphetamine attributable to Foster, including relevant conduct, is more than 1.5 kilograms.
Paniagua admitted that he helped broker and served as an interpreter for methamphetamine sales between conspirators in California. Paniagua also assisted by traveling from California to Kansas City to help facilitate the delivery of methamphetamine to Kansas City, or the delivery of money from the proceeds of methamphetamine sales from Kansas City back to California.
Hampton also pleaded guilty to possessing a firearm in furtherance of a drug-trafficking crime and to illegally possessing firearms. Hampton was arrested on Feb. 28, 2007, while in possession of 177.1 grams of pure methamphetamine, which has been fronted (provided on consignment) by Wilson for $19,200, and a Sig Sauer .40-caliber pistol. Law enforcement officers also seized 24 firearms from Hampton's residence, along with $6,792 in drug trafficking proceeds. Hampton admitted that he was supplied by Wilson with pound quantities of methamphetamine for distribution.
The amount of methamphetamine attributable to Hampton, including relevant conduct, is more than 1.5 ki-lograms.
Brandon R. Stone, 27, of Nevada, Mo., was sentenced on Wednesday, May 20, 2009, to six years and eight months in federal prison without parole. Stone pleaded guilty on July 29, 2008, to his role in the methamphetamine conspiracy and to illegally possessing firearms. Stone admitted that he was in possession of a Savage Arms .22-caliber rifle on July 11, 2007, in Vernon County, Mo. At that time, Stone was an unlawful user of methamphetamine. Stone also admitted that he was supplied by Wilson with methamphetamine for distribution. The amount of methamphetamine attributable to Stone, including relevant conduct, is more than 1.5 kilograms.
Dustin L. Vittetoe, 34, of Horton, Mo., was sentenced on April 2, 2009, to 10 years in federal prison without parole. Vittetoe pleaded guilty in July 2008 to his role in the drug-trafficking conspiracy. Vittetoe admitted that the amount of pure methamphetamine attributable to him is more than 1.5 kilograms.
Vittetoe also admitted that in June 2007 he approached an agent with the Community Narcotics Enforcement Team (CNET) and attempted to bribe the officer to provide protection for the drug-trafficking organization.
Two co-defendants were convicted at trial on March 26, 2009, and await sentencing. Ronald Willis, 62, of Lamar, Mo., and Juan Lara, 60, of Ontario, Calif., were found guilty of participating in the drug-trafficking conspiracy. Willis was also found guilty of possessing methamphetamine on Feb. 28, 2007, in Barton County.
Eight additional co-defendants have pleaded guilty to the charges contained in an Oct. 3, 2007, superseding indictment. Daniel Jeffrey McCann, 48, Timothy D. Kennon, 48, and Roderick P. Conway, 38, all of Lamar, Joseph M. Kutina, 32, of Milo, Mo., Michael C. Turner, 47, of Pittsburg, Kan., Michael Robert Conway, 68, of Freistaff, Mo., Jose Lopez, also known as David Cerpa, 40, a citizen of Mexico residing in Ontario, Calif., and Randy S. Lucero, 34, of Highland, Calif., have each pleaded guilty to their roles in the methamphetamine conspiracy. McCann also pleaded guilty to illegally possessing firearms.
Lopez admitted that he supplied methamphetamine to Lucero for distribution. Lucero then transported the methamphetamine -- usually by a courier traveling via Amtrak -- from California to his main distributor, Wilson, in Missouri.
Lara, Lopez, Lucero and Medina were arrested in August 2007 when they traveled to Kansas City to deliver a shipment of methamphetamine to Wilson. Police officers discovered 26 individually wrapped packages containing 11.62 kilograms (approximately 25 pounds) of methamphetamine in a hidden compartment of the Chevrolet Trailblazer that was driven by Medina, in which Lopez was a passenger. In addition to the conspiracy, Medina pleaded guilty to possession with the intent to distribute in excess of 500 grams of methamphetamine.
Michael Robert Conway admitted that he was paid by Wilson to transport shipments of methamphetamine from Kansas City to Lamar in the bed of his pickup truck.
This case is being prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney David P. Rush. It was investigated by the Drug Enforcement Administration, the sheriff's departments of Vernon, Barton, and Jasper counties, CNET (the Community Narcotics Enforcement Team), the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, IRS-Criminal Investigation, the Kansas Bureau of Investigation, the Missouri State Highway Patrol, and the police departments of Lamar, Mo., and Nevada, Mo.
Sentencing hearings for more local defendents are scheduled within the next two weeks.
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For everyone above. Some people have changed from 3-6 years ago and some people can learn from their mistakes and others should see that. Money is not everything, some people have been a good member of society and has done some good things for this town. if you have been a contributing member of society that should play a good role on your behalf. some people can not say that they have ever contrubuted to our town or anything else for that matter!!
Money is not everything. Some people have truely changed from 3-6 years ago. If someone can learn from their mistakes and go forward in a postive manner should mean something. Some people have been a contrubting member of society and others that truely know someone will see that. Not everyone can or will change and that is a sad thing. If you get in with the wrong crowd you should not punished for ever if they are doing right now. it seems as if someone is angry if they did not put every name in every article you to seem to know more than what others seem to know from the paper!!
We never know how of our lives are going to be impacted from choices of others from day to day. Let us remember that our actions and words will also make either a positive impact or a negative one on others. Which will you choose? It is not my place to pass any judgment on anyone. I do not know the individuals involved. What I do know is that each of these individuals have parents, family and friends that love them. I do know it is not my place to pass judgement because we never know what tomorrow will bring!
I understand where you are coming from. Look at what money has done to society and it is not always a positive thing, is it? I respect your opinion.
It appears to me that now we are putting Zacks parents on trial here. If any of you have children you can thank God if yours didn't end up in a mess similar to this. It is not Zack's upbringing that got him in to this. His parents are great people and leaders in the community. There have been many very well built, nice homes in the Nevada area that wouldn't have been built with such quality if it hadn't been for Erwin Construction.
If there is a catastrophy in Nevada, who do the athorities contact first? Who provides the benchmark for other builders? Think about this for a while.
If you were a good loving parent and had the means to help you child with a situation like this, would you do it? I for one would!
This is a federal case. It is not decided by the local "beer drinking" buddies of the prosecuter here in Vernon county.
Being successful in a small town has some disadvantages. A large percentage of people like to see successful people have problems, it would seem.
At best this is a travisty and my heart goes out to the Erwins.
what happened to the other commments? Why were they deleted? apparently they were true!!!
Other comments were deleted because of the use of a person's name who was not mentioned in the article.
All deletions were at the direction of Publisher Julie Righter.
I for one would like to thank the prosecutor and all the deputies and other law enforcement officers that helped get these large amounts of methamphetimines of the streets and away from the community. I see too many people led astray by drug use and alchoholism. We should be THANKING the sheriffs dept. and all other parts of law enforcement that aided in bringing down this multimillion dollar conspiricy. Imagine how many lives they have saved in stopping these drugs from getting to the streets another day, time away from their families to protect our families. How many people DIDN'T overdose, commit suicide, murder someone? thanks to them.
THANK YOU
I agree. That's the important part.
Since the reporters can answer questions, maybe they can answer this one. Why was his name conveniently left out of this and other articles?
His name was left out because he was not in the first indictment. You'll get to see it soon enough.
When you live in a small town, in my opinion, the people with the most money will always be covered. The person in question never done anything that I know of for the community. As far as his family? They might have a few bucks, but I have always seen them as very rude, I'm better than you, I don't want to pay for what I get or what I do, kind of people. Everytime I have ever had to deal with one of his family members, in my opinion, he was not a pleasant person by any means! This opinion does not come from a person of or from money. However it does come from a citizen that works everyday, pays their own bills, not on welfare, not a drug user, and tax payer. I used no names or obscene comments, but this may be deleted too. We'll see.
It is nice to see that most of us share the same opinion.
The one whose name is being left out played a bigger role than most the ones already sentenced. I'm certain because of who his family is his sentence will be less than he deserves.
nobody knows the truth unless you were there and if you were your name should be there to. If everybody would keep their opinions to their self our town might not have half the mess it does today.
Seems to me someONE has alot of opinion but thinks everyone could make your town a better place by keeping opinion to ourselves maybe they should take their own advise.
If your town would stop hidding names of drug dealers more less saying its ok what he did maybe your town wouldn't be in the mess it is today either. Let the town know who he is and the part he played let him have to face society with the things he has done. The way it is covering him up he will be right back into it in no time then where your town going to be
I give a very BIG congratulations to those who worked very hard at putting the drug operation to rest. There were many who dedicated hours, apun hours to this case. There hard work is much appriciated. Hopefully we can see many more operations shut down and try to end the large flow of drugs in our community. Way to go guys!!
You know I think its great that these drugs and drug dealers were gotten off the streets. What I don't get is all the praise for the legal agents that brought this about. #1 this is a job they applied for and wanted to do, did they put in overtime, great don't we all? Do they get paid more than our soliders in a war zone, they sure do. Be glad you town is a bit safer but as for praise I don't think so. This is part of the job so how long will they ride the coat tails of this little bit of PR? Nevada is still the same and that is so sad, but this story just shows nothing has changed.
Really the community is mislead by all of this. The reason most drug "rings" dealers are brought down are because of others getting caught and then telling on others. How much work does one have to to when the story is already told to them? So it makes law enforcements jobs just that much easier so I'm just asking myself why did the investigation go on so long?
Now secondly the "War on Drugs" is lost. The government has lost the war and just can't or hasn't admitted it yet. Theres roughly 7 million people in the system and 2.2 million in which are incarcerated. It cost the government roughly 40 - 80 billion dollars to fight the "War on Drugs" and the DEA says they only stop 10% of which comes into the nation. So 40 - 80 billion dollars for a 90% failure rate, Wow don't we think in this day of age we could find something better to waste our money on?
Then you get into Constitutional Rights "Freedom of Choice".The Constitution lets us have the freedom of choice. If we chose to drink alcohol or smoke tobacco theres nothing stopping us but merely a age limit. So why throw people in jail for doing the same victimless crimes as using drugs. But then your probaly saying to yourself "Drugs" do harm others. Well so does alcohol and tobacco even fast food for that matter. So again why are we still having a "War on Drugs"
In the recession whatever you want to call it 40 - 80 billion dollars could do alot. The "War on Drugs" is almost 40 years old and still the increase in drug useage is up the purity of the drugs are up so stop the nonsense and stop the war. Regulate it ,Tax it and put the money to good use, Start school programs with the money to help the kid better understand how the drugs effect you. And I'm not talking about the "D.A.R.E" program the local law enforcement uses to get federal funding actual class through school.
I have a neighbor that was recently arrested for a drug crime. she had three other criminals in her apartment and meth building materieals and supplies.She and two of the others were out of jail in a few hours and she was back on property. I was wondering why they can get out so soon and don't we have laws that say if you have meth lab materials in your home that the home then becomes inhabitable afterwards? Can anyone answer that? i am curious and in our town if you ask a civil question to law enforcement thet tend to be rude.
Well "Labs" materials can consist of just cold tablets and a box of matches, So in turn I guess everyone Probaly has "Lab" materials in thier houses. I'm sure the County your in assuming its "Barton" county called in the Hazzardous waste crew to come clean it up. I'm sure Law Enforcement would never break procedure and not clean up the Dangerous Chemicals from a meth lab. Or if not maybe it's not as dangerous as the media is stating here's acopy from drugwarfacts.org
Annual Causes of Death in the United States
Tobacco 435,000
Poor Diet and Physical Inactivity 365,000
Alcohol 85,000
Microbial Agents 75,000
Toxic Agents 55,000
Motor Vehicle Crashes 26,347
Adverse Reactions to Prescription Drugs 32,000
Suicide 30,622
Incidents Involving Firearms 29,000
Homicide 20,308
Sexual Behaviors 20,000
All Illicit Drug Use, Direct and Indirect 17,000
Non-Steroidal Anti-Inflammatory Drugs Such As Aspirin 7,600
Marijuana 0
Here's the website http://drugwarfacts.org/cms/?q=node/30
Now judge for yourself and determine the real threats of death in the U.S. 5 times more people die from alcohol per year then all "Illegal" drugs combined. Why aren't we at war with alcohol? Why don't we imprison the distributor and user of alcohol like were doing to drug distributors and users? Why don't we imprison the doctor that prescribe the drug that people over dose on. Maybe it's time the citizens wake up and see the the real problems with society.
Here is another story in the Joplin Globe from June 1st
A 27-year-old man was sentenced Monday to five years in prison for plying a 13-year-old girl with alcohol and sexually assaulting her three years ago.
5 years in state prison he'll be out for parole in what just acouple years.... and again look it's not meth,crack or cocaine its ALCOHOL!
very well put