DRUG HAUL IN CHESCO JUST A START

Authorities say the Northeast gets up to 150 tons of cocaine a year.

The 1,804 pounds of cocaine confiscated Sunday in Chester County is just a
fraction of the amount of the drug brought into the Philadelphia region,
police say.

"What we're seeing is a glut of cocaine that is for sale on the market,"
state police Maj. Tyree Blocker said. "The drug of choice in Pennsylvania
is cocaine, and it has been on the increase."

On Sunday, Trooper Thomas Martinez pulled over a tractor-trailer on the
Pennsylvania Turnpike after the driver changed lanes erratically in Honey
Brook Township near the Morgantown Exit. After the driver gave written
permission to search the trailer, authorities found 820 kilos of cocaine
hidden under a load of cilantro.

In September, police found 1,227 pounds of cocaine with a load of cilantro
in Horsham Township, Montgomery County. Also last year, 228 pounds of
cocaine was seized from a car in Northeast Philadelphia and 200 pounds were
confiscated at Philadelphia International Airport.

The amount of cocaine confiscated keeps going up, officials said this week.

State police seized 5,009 pounds last year, compared with nearly 29 pounds
in 1997. Nationally, the federal Drug Enforcement Administration seized 120
tons of cocaine last year, compared to 115 tons in 1997. Last year was the
fourth consecutive increase since 1995, when authorities seized 106 tons,
according to Larry McElynn, a special agent in the DEA's Philadelphia office.

"You can probably double that amount and that's what's being distributed on
the streets," McElynn said. "There are an awful lot of drugs coming into
America and it gets worse each year."

So the size of the seizure on Sunday was not surprising, McElynn said. He
said federal agents have been warning state and local authorities to watch
for shipments moving through their areas.

"We've been sending the word out throughout Pennsylvania that this type of
stuff is going on on a weekly basis," McElynn said.

"This was worth a lot of money. There's going to be people weeping and
gnashing their teeth."

The seizure was the largest in Chester County to date. In recent years,
local law enforcement officials have worked with state and federal agencies
after seeing wars between rival drug gangs and shootings in areas such as
Coatesville.

"There are no coca plants in Chester County, there are no labs to produce
the cocaine," said George Painter, coordinator of Chester County's
Municipal Drug Task Force.

"The cocaine is here because of money. It perpetuates itself because of the
profit," Painter said. "Police make it more difficult and drug dealers are
looking at law enforcement as an occupational hazard."

In September in Montgomery County, residents called police to complain
about a foul smell coming from a parked refrigerated tractor-trailer.
Police found the trailer loaded with rotting cilantro, which often is used
to mask the smell of drugs, officials said.

But the 1,227 pounds of cocaine in the truck started to smell as the
cilantro rotted.

"There was a liquid coming from the truck and it apparently had a pretty
foul odor," Montgomery County Assistant District Attorney Steve Fairlie said.

That shipment and the load seized Sunday, with a street value estimated at
more than $16 million, were not bound for the Philadelphia suburbs. They
were just moving through the region and were detected by chance rather than
through an elaborate investigation, police said.

"Large shipments of cocaine crisscross the country every day," Fairlie
said. "It's not uncommon to stumble upon drugs in that fashion. These cases
come across my desk every day. It's just not necessarily in that size."

In both big local cases, authorities believe the cocaine came into the
United States via Mexico, crossing the Texas border. In Montgomery County,
truck driver Armando Robles, 40, of Weslaco, a south Texas border town, is
scheduled for trial next month. In Chester County, driver Jorge Luna, 40,
of San Juan, Texas, remains in jail with bail set at $1 million.

Federal officials report that an estimated 800 tons of cocaine is produced
in South America each year, primarily in Colombia. About 300 tons come to
the United States. Of that, 150 tons are transported to the Northeast.

"If you really take a look at those amounts and what the drugs are worth,
you have to think, 'My God, how much is really out there?' " McElynn said.