ROUECHE OPERATED THROUGH VIOLENCE

International drug lord Clay Roueche was arrested just last year, but
the cracks in his United Nations gang started surfacing in early 2005.

That's when UN helicopters flying clandestinely across the border hit
the radar of police in both Washington state and B.C.

According to U.S. court documents filed for Roueche's sentencing
hearing this week, Chilliwack RCMP were already following some of
Roueche's UN associates by the third week of 2005.

They tracked a Robinson R22 helicopter CGZAR to Hangar No. 3 at
Chilliwack Airport on Jan. 24, 2005. The hangar was rented by Joe
Curry, who had used his credit card to purchase chopper fuel. Like
Roueche, Curry was later charged with conspiracy to traffic in the
U.S. Unlike Roueche, he remains in Canada.

A day later, RCMP surveillance followed a car to Hangar No. 3 and
later to a meeting with someone driving a vehicle registered to UN
gang member Daryl Johnson. Johnson's car then was driven to UN Gang
member Douglas Vanalstine's business in Abbotsford, where Vanalstine's
car was also parked. Late last month, both Vanalstine and Johnson were
charged in B.C. with conspiracy to traffic cocaine after an undercover
operation by the Combined Forces Special Enforcement. Vanalstine is
also charged on the same indictment in Washington state to which
Roueche has pleaded guilty.

The U.S. Attorney was asking for a 30-year-sentence for Roueche, but
his lawyer Todd Maybrown says that is disproportionate to those of
others already convicted in the same international drug conspiracy.

And there are many.

Roueche may be the top-ranking UN gangster to go down on drug charges,
but at least a dozen of his mules and smugglers were also arrested,
charged, convicted and jailed in the U.S., according to courts. While
his minions were being arrested, Roueche managed to evade capture and
continued to run the lucrative smuggling business.

Others Charged Include:

- - B.C. resident Alexander Swanson was arrested on Aug. 12,
2005--off-loading UN pot in Washington.

- - Calgary brothers Zachary and Braydon Miraback were arrested in
Puyallup on Sept. 21, 2005 with 1,000 pounds (450 kg) of B.C. bud that
had been flown across by helicopter earlier that day.

- - U.S. warrants were issued for the arrests of two Fraser Valley
men--Trevor Schoutens and Brian Fews--who had been followed across the
border by U.S. agents several times as they facilitated the movement
of marijuana.

- - On Dec. 1, 2005, B.C. resident Greg Fielding was nabbed with 326
pounds (148 kg) of pot stuffed into hockey bags that had been dropped
off by a white float plane on Soap Lake, near Spokane.

- - Three months later, on March 14, 2006, B.C. pilot Kevin Haughton was
arrested by the Colville Tribal Police after he abandoned a float
plane with 314 pounds (142 kg) of marijuana and 24,000 ecstasy pills.
Haughton told police he worked for Duane Meyer, a UN gangster based in
Abbotsford who was gunned down last year in a targeted hit.

- - Nine days later, two Vancouver women--Sharmila Kumar and Shailen
Varma--were picked up at Soap Lake, where they had also picked up
marijuana that had been flown in to the remote spot.

- - On Sept. 25, 2006, Joshua Hildebrandt and Nicholas Kocoski were
busted near Rimrock, Wash., after flying undetermined contraband in a
rented Piper Cherokee from Chilliwack.

- - Two days later, B.C. resident Daniel LeClerc was arrested near
Yreka, Cal., with 144 kilograms of cocaine in his aircraft. He was en
route to Chilliwack.

- - On Oct. 3, 2006, Chilliwack realtor and close Roueche associate
Michael Gordon, as well as Alexander Kocoski, crossed into Washington
to bail Kocoski's brother and Hildebrandt out of jail. Gordon was
later shot to death in Chilliwack on Aug. 20, 2008.

Many of the Canadians arrested in the U.S. cooperated and pleaded
guilty, providing information about their links in Canada. Others
claimed not to know those behind the shipments they were ferrying or
hauling across the border.

But police in both Canada and the U.S. knew the common denominator was
Clay Roueche and the UN gang. And they set their sights on bigger fish.

Ultimately, it was the American authorities who brought him
down.

They recruited an informant named Ken Davis who had agreed to be one
of Roueche's men in the U.S. , according to public documents filed in
a Seattle court.

With the assistance of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE)
agents, Davis gathered incriminating evidence linking the UN leader to
marijuana and cocaine smuggling and money laundering in the millions.

Davis visited Roueche in Abbotsford and was given Roueche's contacts
in California, to which he was asked to deliver about $500,000 a week
in drug profits and return to Seattle with 25 kilograms of cocaine per
trip.

Roueche told Davis that he needed someone to manage his new drug
"outlets" in San Jose, Calif., and that he was looking for drivers to
get B.C. bud and ecstasy to Texas.

In March 2006, Roueche asked Davis for help getting "the things I
really like," which the U.S. Attorney says is a reference to firearms.

Maybrown argues that the myth of Clay Roueche is bigger than the man
himself.

He said that while the U.S. Attorney claims in its sentencing
documents that UN gang members "have become known for their reputation
of extreme violence," no evidence of Roueche using violence has been
entered.

Two of Roueche's young daughters wrote letters to the judge, pleading
to let "Daddy come out because we had lots of fun together."

Maybrown pointed to Roueche's own words as an indication the gang
leader has changed.

"Until recently, I did not even think about, let alone understand, the
consequences of my actions," Roueche said in a letter to the court. "I
now understand that I have hurt myself, my family members and others."