DRUG-WAR WIN NETS REWARDS FOR COPS

WASHINGTON -- The White House this week is saluting the Central Valley
investigators who busted Merced resident and suspected big-time
marijuana dealer Arnoldo Herrera.

The statewide, monthslong campaign against Herrera was dubbed
Operation Plumas Smoke by law enforcement officers. The White House
drug czar's office calls it the outstanding group investigative effort
of 2007, one of several drug-fighting awards to be presented Thursday
to the valley's local, state and federal investigators.

"We did real well," said Bill Ruzzamenti, director of the Fresno-based
Central Valley High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area. "We do well every
year."

The HIDTA coordinates anti-drug efforts in a nine-county region from
Sacramento to Bakersfield.

On Thursday, officers will pick up four group awards and two
individual awards from the Office of National Drug Control Policy.

The White House office provides the nonmonetary awards as a morale
booster for officers involved in the Bush administration's National
Marijuana Initiative. "They are taking on what some people think are
just harmless hippies up in the hills, but who are really Mexican
drug-trafficking organizations," Scott Burns, deputy director of the
Drug Control Policy office, said Monday. "It's important to reward and
acknowledge their exceptional service."

Several dozen valley law enforcement officers will attend the ceremony
being held at the Treasury Department.

The six drug-fighting awards going to Central Valley law enforcement
officers are among 40 national awards being presented.

"This is one aspect of our drug control policy that's been effective,"
Burns said.

Wiretap key to operation

Operation Plumas Smoke kicked off in June.

Supervised by Brent Wood of the California Department of Justice's
Bureau of Narcotics Enforcement, investigators located a dozen major
marijuana gardens scattered throughout Santa Clara, Butte, Plumas and
Humboldt counties. A wiretap on Herrera's phone led investigators to
identify other conspirators, according to a summary of the
investigation.

"As each of his gardens was eradicated, Herrera got more and more
distraught," a sum-mary of the operation stated, further alleging
that Herrera eventually became a marijuana broker for other growers.

Over several months, the investigators said they seized 101,439 mature
marijuana plants and 297 pounds of processed mari-juana, along with
firearms and $50,000 in cash.

In October, investigators concluded the operation with the arrests of
14 people.

Herrera is in the Fresno County jail, awaiting trial on charges that
could send him to federal prison for the rest of his life.

Jerry Adams, who set up a Central Valley "marijuana intelligence
fusion center," and intelligence analyst Jill Edwards, who helped
start the center in late 2004, are receiving individual awards.

"She gets hundreds of calls and e-mails from federal or local drug
agents asking her to validate an obscure piece of information that
might be a key link in the jigsaw puzzle world of investigating (drug
dealers)," an award summary states.

Congress established the High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area program
in 1988 as a way to target federal funding and coordinate efforts in
specific regions. It started with five designated areas, including Los
Angeles.

Since then, often at the behest of lawmakers, 28 drug trafficking
areas have been designated, covering 13 percent of all U.S. counties.

The Central Valley HIDTA began in 1999, targeting methamphetamine
production. It has shifted more attention to large-scale marijuana
operations.

"The Mexican-based organizations that were involved in meth have now
fled to Mexico," Ruzzamenti said.