Date: 2002/01/13 18:16
From: The Webfairy <webfairy@enteract.com>
To: cia-drugs@yahoogroups.com
January 11, 2002
BY STEVE WARMBIR AND FRANK MAIN STAFF REPORTERS
Federal agents decapitated a Chicago-based Middle Eastern drug
trafficking ring with more than 15 arrests here Thursday and are
investigating whether profits bankrolled terrorism.
The early morning sweep was part of more than 60 arrests across the
country in 12 cities, including Detroit and Chicago, that targeted
illegal trafficking in a common cold pill ingredient that's transformed
at clandestine drug labs into methamphetamine--known as speed or meth on
the street.
In Chicago, agents arrested twin 38-year-old brothers, one of them
living in a $900,000 Burr Ridge home, who allegedly headed the Esawi
trafficking group.
The brothers, Khaldon Esawi and Khaled Esawi, who also goes by Khaled
Obeid, trafficked in more than 100 million tablets of pseudoephedrine
worth millions since 1999, authorities allege.
Two shipments linked to the brothers, sent in October and December last
year, amounted to 20 million tablets alone. That's about half the number
of cold tablets sold by a large drug company in a typical year.
The group was so streamlined that one shipment of pseudoephedrine went
from the Canadian border to an illegal lab in California in just four
days.
The shipments often would contain a cover load of paper towels or
detergent.
The two brothers are Jordanian nationals, and the majority of those
arrested nationwide Thursday are from Jordan or Iraq.
The arrests were the latest in the ongoing Operation Mountain Express, a
two-year DEA effort that targets traffickers across the nation.
"We will seek them out, we will arrest them, we will take their assets,"
U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald said.
Nationwide, some drug money from the various operations has been sent to
the Middle East. But authorities stressed they have found no ties to
terrorism yet, either nationwide or in the local case.
DEA agents, marshaling tips from informants and bugs on cellular phones,
tracked not one, but two shipments last year of the cold tablets from
Chicago to California, where middlemen distributed the pills to illegal
labs run by Mexican drug cartels.
The pills were nicknamed "slaughtered sheep" by the traffickers, and the
pills started their journey in Canada.
Pseudoephedrine is mainly manufactured as a powder in China, and made
into pill form by Canadian companies.
Those firms sold massive quantities of the cold medicine ingredient to a
Canadian company, which in turn supplied them to the Esawi brothers, who
stored them in Chicago area warehouses, authorities allege.
Canada has become the top source for pseudoephedrine for traffickers,
who need massive quantities and can't simply go into local drugstores
and buy cold pills off the shelves for the ingredient.
Canada needs to beef up its regulations on the cold pill ingredient to
deter illegal sales, said Michael DeMarte, the special agent in charge
of the DEA in Chicago.
The two Esawi brothers were allegedly trafficking in pseudoephedrine
since at least 1999 and needed ways to launder their money.
They did so, authorities believe, through two used car dealerships they
owned about a block apart in Bridgeview--Prestige Motor Cars, formerly
known as Harlem Motors Cars, and Affordable Motors. The drug cash was
washed through car sales.
The two men often carried large amounts of cash.
One brother was once stopped at Midway Airport with about $123,000,
while another was stopped at the Canadian border with about $400,000.
The cash was seized in both cases, but the brothers weren't charged at
the time.
In all, more than 80 cars were seized at the two lots on Thursday by DEA
agents, who were joined in the case by U.S. Customs and the Internal
Revenue Service.
Agents also hit homes and businesses, and during the raids found
documents confirming some of the suspects have traveled to Canada.
Out of the 14 people charged in the Chicago cases, three were still at
large Thursday, authorities said. The men in custody will have bond
hearings next week, Assistant U.S. Attorney Kevin J. Powers said.
Several other men arrested in Chicago were expected to be shipped to
other cities, where they face charges in the nationwide investigation.
Two of the men in custody in Chicago were implicated in another
pseudoephedrine trafficking case that had no known ties to the Esawi
organization.
In the Esawi case, investigators secretly recorded conversations between
participants that contained a mix of God and money.
Khaled Esawi told one member of the group that he hoped that an illegal
shipment was fine "for the prophet's sake."
It will be so, if "God is willing," the man replied.
Contributing: AP
--
Patriotism means you care enough about your country to fight for
justice.
http://emperors-clothes.com
-- Jared Israel
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