FEDS THWART DRUG SMUGGLERS

WASHINGTON - Federal agents have arrested 261 people and seized
cocaine, marijuana and cash in an effort to break up a smuggling
operation that transported drugs from Colombia to at least a dozen
U.S. cities.

The Drug Enforcement Administration, working with several other law
enforcement agencies and authorities in Mexico and Colombia, arrested
76 people Wednesday. Previously, 185 had been arrested as part of a
crackdown dubbed ``Operation Marquis.''

Joseph Keefe, the DEA's chief of operations, described the bust as one
of the largest of its kind in recent memory.

Arrests were conducted simultaneously during the early morning hours
in 16 cities, the DEA said. It said that provisional arrest warrants
naming 14 suspects in Mexico were being submitted to Mexican
authorities.

Keefe said the multi-agency operation has crippled a drug trafficking
organization run by the brother of drug lord Amado Carrillo-Fuentes,
who died in 1997 after a botched plastic surgery.

Vincente Carrillo-Fuentes, Jose Albino Quintero-Meraz and suspected
drug kingpin Alcides Ramon Magana, arrested in the Gulf coast state of
Tabasco earlier this month, are alleged to be the central players in
the smuggling operation, Keefe said.

``We have disrupted their organization and made it much more difficult
for them to function in the United States,'' Keefe said.

During the year-and-a-half investigation, agents seized 9,000
kilograms of cocaine, 28,000 pound of marijuana and $12.5 million in
cash.

DEA officials said drugs from Colombia were trucked or flown to Nuevo
Laredo, Mexico, on the U.S. border. In some cases, officials said, the
smugglers used special radar-evading planes.

From Nuevo Laredo, they said, the drugs were smuggled into the United
States, either in covert compartments on trucks or cars passing
through a commercial border crossing in Laredo, Texas, or by
individuals coming across the border into Texas.

The drugs were then stored in local warehouses before being
distributed to cities across the United States, DEA officials said.

It said the organization shipped the drugs in tractor-trailers, with
the narcotics concealed by cover loads of produce, and said cars with
concealed compartments also were used.

A Laredo, Texas, warehouse for Corona beer was among those being
searched Wednesday. Officials said one suspect under arrest had an
office at the facility.

The investigation penetrated many local distribution operations. A
defendant alleged to be a local distributor in Cleveland was a
maintenance worker for the local school district, who allegedly
distributed crack and cocaine at recreation centers, officials said.

Arrests were made or planned in Laredo, San Antonio, Houston, Dallas
and Austin, Texas; Little Rock, Ark.; New York; Newark, N.J.;
Charlotte, N.C.; Cleveland; St. Louis; San Diego; Philadelphia;
Baltimore; Nashville and Memphis, Tenn.

The investigation was conducted by the FBI, the DEA, the Justice
Department and the Customs Service. Federal agents were assisted by 86
state and local law enforcement agencies. Mexican and Colombian
authorities also contributed to the investigation, the DEA said.