WITNESSES GIVE DETAILS ABOUT DRUG DELIVERIES

A confessed "mule" who became a government witness testified
Wednesday how a "$400 to $500 a week" methamphetamine habit led him to
carry the drug from Texas to Southwestern Indiana. William Buxton told
a U.S. District Court jury in Evansville that he was earning $56,000 a
year as service manager for a Texas auto dealership.

Buxton said he was addicted to "crank" when he made as many as 13 runs
to Vincennes, Ind., bringing quantities of methamphetamine from
defendant Miguel Angel Quintanilla's home.

Quintanilla is the alleged key connection for funneling the drug from
Mexico.

Quintanilla is one of six defendants facing 20 years to life in prison
if convicted in connection with an operation that investigators say
was linked to the Mexican mafia.

Also on trial are Quintanilla's wife, Denese, Alfredo Ceballos, Leonel
Moreno Jr., Alan Martinez-Guzman and Abelardo Lalo-Mendoza.

In the third day of testimony
of a trial expected to last two weeks, jurors got their first detailed
look at inner workings of what the government contends was a meth
organization funnelling more than 25 pounds of the drug into Indiana.

A pound of the drug distributed on the streets in Indiana brought
$30,000, drug investigators say.

Quintanilla, federal agents say, bought the meth for $4,000 a
pound.

Buxton, who entered a plea agreement to a federal charge against him,
was followed on the stand by his fiancee, Terri Nichols, who is also
an admitted meth addict.

Nichols said she was Buxton's companion on one airplane trip and two
auto trips to deliver drugs, and also made two trips to Indiana on her
own.

The trips typically ended at the Vincennes Holiday Inn, according to
testimony by Buxton and Nichols. Both said they had handed over from 1
pound to 2 pounds of meth per trip to a man they knew as "Cachetes."

In return, both said that at each handoff Cachetes gave them a bag
containing what they understood to be between $10,000 and $20,000.

They said they would take the money back to Quintanilla at his Dallas
home and take their cut, typically $2,000.

During testimony, Buxton and Nichols identified Cachetes as defendant
Alfredo Ceballos.

Buxton testified that his wife, Jennifer, also had accompanied him on
drug runs that began in 1999 and ended with Buxton's arrest by
Vincennes police in April 2000. That arrest touched off an
investigation that resulted in 28 indictments here and in the Dallas
area, U.S. prosecutors say.

Buxton and Nichols acknowledged carrying on an affair at the time they
made the drug runs, though Buxton was still married to Jennifer
Buxton. The couple have since divorced, Buxton testified.

Buxton, who appeared relaxed during his testimony, was the object of
prosecution attempts to bolster his credibility as a witness. He said
he typically made the highway trips to Indiana in his mother's Isuzu
Trooper. She came to Indiana to post a cash bond for his release from
the Knox County Jail.

Buxton, who was arrested for meth possession while driving his
vehicle, withstood prosecution attempts to challenge his credibility
and competence, particularly the accuracy of his memory while under
the influence of crank.

He said he typically went three to four days without sleep while on
the drug, and sometimes was "up" for six or seven days. The drug, he
said, kept him alert and made him want to do otherwise unpleasant
tasks, "like mowing grass."

When U.S. Attorney Brad Blackington questioned Buxton, apparently
attempting to counter defense contentions that Buxton didn't know for
sure the content of the packages he was delivering, Buxton cracked:

"I knew that if I was being paid $2,000 to carry a package that I
wasn't carrying bubble gum."

Nichols said she once observed Miguel and Denese Quintanilla wrapping
methamphetamine, first in green Saran Wrap and then with black tape.
Nichols said she transported the package to Indiana.

On auto trips, the drug was carried in the dashboard near the steering
column of his vehicle, Buxton said.