OFFICIALS SAY HEROIN ARRESTS SHOW NEW SUPPLY ROUTES

Federal authorities said yesterday that they had broken up a major
Colombian drug-exporting ring that was smuggling millions of dollars worth
of heroin each month into New York and elsewhere.

Prosecutors said that among the 25 people arrested, both in New York and
Colombia, were the group's leader and two top aides. The extradition of the
three to the United States is now being sought.

The arrests highlight what the authorities say has been the use of
increasingly sophisticated smuggling techniques and the emergence of
Colombia as a successor to Asia as the major heroin supplier to the United
States.

In describing the new techniques, James B. Comey, the United States
attorney in Manhattan, told of chemists working in Colombian laboratories
who dissolved heroin into clothing that was folded and packed in suitcases
and carried by couriers into the United States. Then, chemists in this
country extracted the heroin and had it prepared for sale on the street, he
said.

"Heroin is back in New York, and it is back with a vengeance," Mr. Comey
said. He added that, while 20 years ago, the heroin sold on the streets of
New York came from Southwest and Southeast Asia, "The Colombian drug lords
have branched out from cocaine and have come to dominate that traffic."

Felix J. Jimenez, special agent in charge of the Drug Enforcement
Administration's New York field office, said United States investigators
worked closely in the yearlong investigation with Colombian law enforcement
authorities, including sharing intelligence information developed in both
countries.

Mr. Comey, who was joined at a news conference by a general from the
Colombian National Police, said the drug ring was "among the most powerful,
the most dominant heroin organizations in the world."

Prosecutors said the group smuggled 10 to 20 kilograms of heroin, with a
street value of $1.5 to $3 million, into the United States each month.

Mr. Comey said the Colombians' move into the American marketplace reflected
"just economics." In the last decade, he said, Colombian drug lords, long
major cocaine exporters, realized they could also grow opium in the
Colombian climate. By selling at high purity and a low price, he said, they
saw they could make inroads into the market share held by the Asian countries.

"It's what we might call in another market 'predatory pricing,' " Mr. Comey
said, "and they essentially captured the market, particularly here on the
East Coast, but throughout most of the country."

The indictment, unsealed yesterday in Federal District Court in Manhattan,
charges that the organization, led by Jose Jairo Garcia-Giraldo, bought
heroin on the open market after it was grown on farms and refined in
laboratories. The heroin was then prepared for smuggling in special
packaging mills, where it was "secreted in hidden compartments in luggage
and soaked into clothing for transit to the United States," the indictment
said.

Couriers then carried the heroin into the United States on commercial
flights, for distribution in New York City, Philadelphia and Boston. Some
was transported in less sophisticated ways as well, Mr. Comey said. For
example, he said, Colombian investigators have seized 15 kilograms of
heroin, much of it in pellet form, suggesting that it was to be swallowed
by people known as mules, who would then carry it into the United States.

Along with Mr. Garcia-Giraldo, the United States government is seeking the
extradition of his brother, Fabio, who the indictment said coordinated
shipments to the United States through Ecuador and the recruiting of
couriers. Also sought was Juan Carlos Giraldo-Perez, who was described as
overseeing the packaging of the organization's heroin. The government also
indicted several people it called "New York based distributors" for the group.

None of those arrested in New York appeared in court for arraignment yesterday.

The government said that, among other things, it had seized $490,000 in
drug proceeds in New York and 55 pounds of heroin-soaked clothing from a
courier in Houston.

Mr. Comey said that the heroin "made the clothing fairly rough - you
wouldn't want to wear it."