Jury Hears How Ring Smuggled 60 Tons of Marijuana Into U.S.

Rafael Caro-Quintero’s narcotics operation delivered nearly 60 tons of marijuana for distribution to Southern California during U.S. drug agent Enrique Camarena’s six-month campaign to wipe out the ring’s plantations across the Mexican border, a foreman for the operation testified Thursday.

In the first detailed testimony about the Mexican drug ring’s operations in the United States, former ground foreman Eugene Hollestelle told a federal jury in Los Angeles about the sophisticated operation that delivered large quantities of marijuana from a remote desert landing site near Tucson to stash houses in Tucson and Riverside.

Operating under cover of darkness with a huge cargo helicopter, specially equipped trucks and a series of radio code phrases, the Southern California operation was headed by Donald Walters of San Pedro and Rene Martin Verdugo-Urquidez, one of three men charged in the February, 1985, murder of Camarena and his pilot near Guadalajara, Hollestelle testified.

Hollestelle said he overheard one conversation between Walters and Verdugo-Urquidez shortly after the murder, when Verdugo-Urquidez referred to “the narc” and said “something about someone being beaten . . . they were beggin’, cryin’.”

Bodies Found

Federal prosecutors believe Camarena was taken to Caro-Quintero’s house in Guadalajara and tortured for more than 24 hours before he was finally killed with several heavy blows to the head. The badly beaten bodies of the drug agent and his pilot were found about a month later on a remote Mexican ranch.

Camarena had just completed a six-month investigation of Caro-Quintero’s marijuana operations in Chihuahua and Zacatecas that had led to the seizure of more than 10 tons of marijuana.

In testimony Wednesday, a former real estate agent said he ran into Verdugo-Urquidez, who was accompanied by a police commander, at Caro-Quintero’s house on the day after Camarena’s abduction.

“We also had a problem. We took care of it, didn’t we, comandante?” the agent quoted Verdugo-Urquidez as saying.

Verdugo-Urquidez’s lawyer, Juanita Brooks, presented evidence showing that Verdugo-Urquidez was in his hotel room when he allegedly made the remark. She also indicated that Walters has disputed Hollestelle’s account of the conversation about “the narc.”

Bought Helicopter

Hollestelle said Caro-Quintero sent Walters $500,000 cash through Verdugo-Urquidez to purchase a Sikorsky S-58T helicopter in late 1983 to begin delivering marijuana at a remote landing strip.

Packed in cellophane in bales of up to 30 pounds each, about 4,000 pounds of marijuana arrived on each shipment, Hollestelle said.

As the helicopter approached in the darkness, Walters would radio down, “How’s your girlfriend Rhonda Fleming?” Hollestelle said, “which meant, give us a red flare so he could see where he was.”

“I was always to say, ‘Not worth a (expletive deleted),’ figuring anyone else who might be there would say everything was fine, and he would know not to come down,” Hollestelle said.

The ground crew became practiced enough to unload all 4,000 pounds into a pair of trucks within six minutes, he said. Hollestelle would drive ahead to the paved road to make sure it was clear, radioing back either “AC power” or “DC power” to indicate whether it was safe for the trucks to proceed.

The trucks themselves traveled to a 10-acre stash estate in Tucson or another stash house the organization had rented in Riverside, where the marijuana was stored in specially sealed rooms designed to keep the distinctive odor from escaping.