Agents Infiltrate Family Network, Bring It Down in 2-Year Operation

The difficulty of breaking methamphetamine’s California connection is illustrated by the two years it took authorities to penetrate one Mexican family’s convoluted meth trafficking business here.

The investigation began in 1991 when agents with the federal Drug Enforcement Administration and the state’s Bureau of Narcotics Enforcement planted an informant into meth trafficking circles in the Inland Empire.

The informant posed as a supplier of large amounts of hydriodic acid, a restricted chemical used in making methamphetamine.

He traded hydriodic acid to his contacts--low-level players in the Jaime Cuevas drug family, it turned out--for methamphetamine and cash, said Assistant U.S. Atty. Larry Cho, who ultimately prosecuted the case in Los Angeles.

Convincing his contacts that he could provide as much hydriodic acid as they needed, he was introduced to higher-ups in the family, Cho said.

Patiently working up the family tree was necessary, said drug agents on the case, because arresting lower-level workers would prove fruitless for two reasons: Either they were relatives of the Cuevas family and would not snitch, or they had been recruited out of the Mexican state where Cuevas has its headquarters and their own family would face retribution if they helped law enforcement.

As the informant further ingratiated himself with the organization, he was allowed to sell hydriodic acid directly to one of the family’s primary meth cookers near Modesto. Still, he was never allowed to visit the actual labs.

The ever-changing locations of the meth labs are closely held secrets, typically known only to the meth cook and his assistants.

Two years into the operation, the informant met with Jaime Cuevas at the Chino Hills home of a Cuevas family member and struck a partnership to make enough methamphetamine to expand sales into Florida, according to agents.

The DEA and state officers now focused their attention on Jaime Cuevas’ hilltop ranch home in Temecula. Agents set up surveillance over the Labor Day weekend, believing something might happen.

Sure enough, a truck pulled up, materials were exchanged and the truck left. Jaime Cuevas was spotted. Out of view of the home, the truck was pulled over and more than two pounds of methamphetamine were found.

Drug agents spent the rest of the day getting a search warrant for the Temecula house, while a surveillance team watched Jaime Cuevas go out to dinner.

A dozen agents raided the house the next day. Inside, they found two pounds of methamphetamine and weapons, and arrested two occupants.

But Jaime Cuevas, it turned out, had not gone to dinner. He had returned to Mexico that evening.

Having shown their cards, the agents rounded up 10 high-level members of the Cuevas family organization.

Investigators also busted a handful of suspects in possession of enough boxed equipment to set up five mobile meth labs.

The government is in court trying to confiscate the Temecula home--which Jaime Cuevas bought for about $350,000 in cash--as a drug-financed asset. Cuevas’ two sons and a sister still live there, authorities say.

Federal and state officers say they continue to bust meth labs that are connected to the Cuevas organization--neither the largest nor the smallest, but one of an estimated 100 methamphetamine-trafficking Mexican families operating in California.