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Law enforcement
officials have announced the arrest of eight people and the seizure
of more than $1.3 million in cash in connection with a large
marijuana smuggling ring operating between the North Country and the
Cleveland, Ohio area.
Franklin County
District Attorney Derek Champagne, speaking at a Wednesday press
conference in Malone, said the arrests were the culmination of a two
year investigation.
“This case is
unfortunately the most recent example of the extent and magnitude of
illicit marijuana trade passing through the North Country,” he said.
“Ohio is just one of the 31 states that have been identified by the
task force as having been directly linked to currency, drugs or
other criminal activity originating in Franklin or St. Lawrence
County.”
Champagne said the
drug trafficking ring has been operating for two to three years.
Over that time, Canadian hydroponic marijuana with a street value of
$18 to 27 million was allegedly being smuggled from Franklin and St.
Lawrence Counties to Ohio.
The investigation
started last year when police in Ohio began looking into Russian
organized crime in the Cleveland area. They found the organization
was receiving large, bi-weekly shipments of marijuana from Northern
New York.
During the
investigation, authorities had 27 year-old Daniel Simonds of
Stockholm under surveillance as a suspected drug courier.
Simonds was murdered
in May 2008 during an unrelated robbery over a drug debt. Charges
are pending against seven people for that killing.
Champagne says
investigators in Ohio teamed up with the federal Drug Enforcement
Agency and authorities in New York to conduct surveillance on other
suspects who were allegedly transporting large amounts of marijuana
from the North Country.
“In this
investigation in a one year period, in excess of 18 loads were
confirmed between Franklin County and Ohio with the average load
having a street value in excess of $500,000,” he said.
Champagne says the
suspects were not only supplying marijuana to Ohio but to other
parts of New York State and the Northeast. They used rental cars,
rather than their own vehicles, to try and cover their tracks.
St. Lawrence County
District Attorney Nicole Duve said it took a long time to unravel
the various threads in the case. “Clearly it started off as
situation that we thought was more of a run of the mill drug rip,”
she said. “It became much more broad and much more significant as a
result of the ongoing investigation.”
On June 15, police
obtained search warrants on homes in the Towns of Dickinson and
Waverly in Franklin County and the Town of Hopkinton in St. Lawrence
County. A convenience store in St. Regis Falls – the Hill Top Stop
– was also searched.
At the same time,
police in Ohio carried out their own searches of homes, businesses
and safe deposit boxes.
A total of eight
people were arrested – five from New York and three from Ohio.
Police have also seized $2 million in assets, including $1.3 million
in cash, a pound of cocaine and 14 vehicles. In one case, $240,000
in cash was hidden inside a computer.
The suspects named
Wednesday are facing felony controlled substance and marijuana
possession charges. They’re expected to face further state and
federal drug trafficking charges. They include the owners of the
Hill Top Stop – 43 year-old Harold Fraser of Dickinson and 38
year-old Sabrina Fraser of Dickinson. Also arrested were 41
year-old William Votra of Hopkinton, 39 year-old Randy Langdon of
St. Regis Falls and 26 year-old Jovane Rosa of Troy.
Three Ohio residents
are also in custody – 23 year-old Konstantin Sorin, 21 year-old
Ashley Schmid and 24 year-old Mark Veverka.
Other arrests are
expected.
David J. Leu, the
resident DEA agent in charge of Northern New York, said the seizure
of $1.3 million in cash was the key part of this case. “By taking
cash you’re actually putting more of a hurt on these organizations
then by taking the weed, because they do it for profit,” he said.
“So if you take their profits, and you seize $240,000 from a
computer, that really puts a hurting on them.”
Leu said they’re
working with Canadian law enforcement officials to find the source
of the marijuana.
Champagne said the
case justifies the federal government’s recent designation of
Franklin County as part of the New York-New Jersey High Intensity
Drug Trafficking Area, which will provide more resources to combat
the cross-border drug trade.
-Chris Knight, 7-2-09
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