Half-Ton of Cocaine Seized by Deputies : Drugs: Amount is largest since department was hit by scandal. Customs agents and Montebello police help in the raids.

Los Angeles County sheriff’s narcotics officers, assisted by U.S. Customs agents and the Montebello Police Department, announced Friday that they had made the largest single drug seizure since a money-skimming scandal racked the law enforcement agency.

Sheriff’s Department officials, who dismantled their major narcotics investigations teams in the wake of the scandal, relied on their two new anti-drug squads to help federal agents and Montebello police seize 498 kilograms of cocaine, about half a ton.

At a news conference with kilograms of cocaine stacked near him, Undersheriff Robert Edmonds said the packaged drugs--worth about $50 million--were discovered Jan. 23 in a flatbed truck parked in the driveway of a San Bernardino County home.

“This is the largest seizure we’ve seen for . . . months now,” Edmonds said. He said the cocaine was seized in the suburb of Bloomington, about 50 miles east of Los Angeles. A home in Perris also was searched as part of an investigation by the task force of about two dozen narcotics officers.

Three men and a woman, who were not identified by authorities, were arrested during the raid, and two pistols and a rifle were confiscated. But after being detained, the suspects were released pending efforts to link them to the cocaine through fingerprints, said Capt. Larry Waldie, head of the sheriff’s narcotics bureau. Two suspects who delivered the cocaine in the truck escaped, he said.

Waldie said the two-week investigation began when the Sheriff’s Department, the U.S. Customs Service and Montebello police developed leads, pooled their information and combined their investigations in Los Angeles and San Bernardino counties.

“We had information that the house might be a good one based on all three agencies and we got lucky,” Waldie said.

The 1,096 pounds nearly matched the entire amount of cocaine--1,602 pounds--seized in 1990 by sheriff’s narcotics officers, according to department statistics. The 1990 figure was down 48% from the year before, when the money-skimming scandal broke that has led to the conviction of seven deputies. The two anti-drugs squads were formed last year.

Edmonds said he was concerned that the seizure indicates drug traffickers are taking advantage of a diversion of military troops from the Mexican border to fight in the Persian Gulf.

“There’s no question that with what is going on in Saudi Arabia right now, some of the assets that were available to us before are not necessarily available to us now,” he said.

But other law enforcement officials were more cautious about drawing such a conclusion.

Cmdr. William Booth of the Los Angeles Police Department said he shared Edmonds’ concerns that more contraband may be crossing the border because of the reduced military presence, but added, “We don’t have any cases or seizures that we think tends to substantiate that this has already happened.”

John Marcello, a Drug Enforcement Administration spokesman in Los Angeles, said his agency also did not see any similar signs. “DEA can’t draw that conclusion based on one 500-kilogram seizure of cocaine,” he said.