THOUSAND OAKS : 11 Indicted After Cocaine Drug Bust

A federal grand jury has indicted 11 people in a three-year cocaine and money-laundering investigation that began in Thousand Oaks.

The indictments were issued Tuesday, naming the first of dozens of suspects taken into custody as a result of the undercover operation organized by the Ventura County Sheriff’s Department and the Oxnard office of the U.S. Customs Service.

None of the suspects live in Ventura County, but one of them, Ruben Dario Mendez-Reascos, was responsible for the shipment of 200 kilograms of cocaine to Thousand Oaks on Jan. 12, the indictment says.

Undercover agents had been hired by Mendez-Reascos to take the cocaine to Detroit and exchange it for $800,000 in cash to be laundered through U.S. bank accounts, said Sgt. Gary Pentis, who supervised much of the case. Instead, investigators seized the cocaine and traded phony drugs for the money in Detroit, he said.

Mendez-Reascos is in federal custody in Detroit and is expected to be brought to Los Angeles, Pentis said.

Other suspects named in the indictment were Fernando Barrera-Saavedra, Guillermo Ruiz, Shawn Michael Perry, Lexiea Underwood, Anthony Duane Vinson, Mark Langenhahn, George Drakopoulos and Lacides L. Angarita. A man and a woman from Los Angeles were also indicted, but they have not been arrested.

Barrera-Saavedra is a resident of Bogota and remains in Colombia. The other eight suspects were taken into custody late last year or in January in Detroit, Chicago or Houston, Pentis said.

The case, which began with a Thousand Oaks informant in October, 1991, led to the largest cash seizure of any Ventura County investigation and the second-largest seizure of cocaine. Authorities said $5.8 million in cash has been confiscated, along with nearly 1,000 pounds of cocaine.