AGENTS BUST BLACK TAR HEROIN RING

130 Arrested, Including In Ohio, On Charges Of Selling Mexican Drug

The hunger for heroin has brought a new form of the drug to Columbus
and smaller central Ohio towns from Mexico, law-enforcement officials said.

Yesterday, law-enforcement agents nationwide launched Operation Black
Gold Rush in an attempt to shut down a ring pushing black tar heroin.

Mexican immigrants were recruited to bring the dark, sticky form of
the drug into the U.S. and to ferry cash back to its makers in the
Mexican state of Nayarit on the Pacific coast, said Fred Alverson,
spokesman for the U.S. attorney's office in Columbus.

Distributors used local dealers who already had networks in Columbus
and Cincinnati, as well as in Bucyrus, Mansfield, Marion and other
cities, to sell the drug to known users and new customers, Alverson said.

In a planned sweep, more than 130 men and women were arrested in
eight states yesterday, Drug Enforcement Administration officials said.

In central Ohio, 20 of the 28 suspects who had been secretly indicted
were arrested by the afternoon.

Black tar heroin, a less-refined form of the drug, has been
manufactured since the 1990s. The Franklin County sheriff's office
noticed it showing up here about nine months ago and asked the DEA
for help. Eventually, Columbus and other law-enforcement agencies
joined the investigation.

The DEA found the group pushing heroin here was also supplying cities
across the country. Other cities involved in the sweep were
Indianapolis; Knoxville, Memphis and Nashville, Tenn.; Denver; Los
Angeles and Riverside, Calif.; Phoenix; Charlotte, N.C.; and
Charleston, Columbia, Florence and Greenville in South Carolina.

The dealers in central Ohio were seen operating near highways,
speeding down to stripmall parking lots and making sales in just
minutes before driving off, said Gary Spartis, deputy criminal chief
of the U.S. attorney's office in Columbus.

Sellers included illegal immigrants and U.S. citizens. They were
making about $5,000 per day here, said Anthony Marotta, assistant
special agent in charge of the DEA office in Columbus.

Agents searched six homes in Columbus and Hilliard and seized records
at La Marketa, 3459 Sullivant Ave., a restaurant-market where they
said suspects were wiring cash back to Mexico. No one answered the
telephone or the door at the business last night.

The local sweep also netted several guns and at least 1 1/2 pounds of heroin.

Officials said they know of no deaths here linked to using black tar heroin.

An increase in opiate use has caught the eye of workers at Maryhaven,
a Columbus drugand alcohol-treatment center. During the fiscal year
that ended in June, 22 percent of the more than 7,000 people treated
at Maryhaven reported that opiates were their drug of choice.

Most was street heroin, although the drugs included synthetically
similar drugs such as Oxycontin, said Paul H. Coleman, president and
chief executive officer of Maryhaven.

Just three or four years ago, opiates were the choice of 10 percent
to 12 percent of users, Coleman said.

"It's clearly growing here in central Ohio," he said.

The 20 suspects accused of selling and using the drug were in U.S.
District Court yesterday for their initial appearances. They were
chained at the ankles and wrists.

Interpreters sat between two pairs of men, translating the
indictments into Spanish. A woman read and reread the indictment
against her, shaking her head and covering her face with her hands.

All those arrested were charged with conspiracy to distribute heroin
and could face up to 20 years in prison and a $1 million fine.

Eleven defendants also face one to three counts each of possession
with intent to sell at least 100 grams of heroin. Each of those
counts carries a minimum of five years and up to 40 years in prison.

Dispatch reporter Theodore Decker contributed to this story.