DEA intercepted Reno calls in Mexican drug bust

RENO (AP) - Federal agents secretly intercepted phone calls to track the four men they arrested last week on charges accusing them of being connected to a deadly Mexican drug cartel trafficking methamphetamine in the Reno area, according to newly unsealed documents.

Investigators listened as a 45-year-old Reno man allegedly set up a meth sale using his runner between Reno and Sacramento on Oct. 19, according to an affidavit for a criminal complaint filed by an agent for the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration.

Officials said the two men are connected with a Mexican drug organization called La Familia, a violent, heavily armed drug-trafficking cartel that allegedly controls the manufacturing and distribution in a region in Mexico and the exportation of cocaine and meth into the United States.

The Reno arrests were part of a nationwide sweep called Project Coronado, which over the past 44 months led to the arrest of 1,186 people allegedly involved in the cartel, and the seizure of about 2,710 pounds of meth, almost 2,000 pounds of cocaine, 29 pounds of heroin, 16,390 pounds of marijuana, 389 weapons and 269 vehicles.

The new affidavit said the agents were able to locate a drug "stash location" by tracking the conversations between Mario Rivera-Gonzales of Reno and his runner, Gerardo Vergara-Nunez of Sacramento, also known as Gallon.

Roque Edwin Gonzalez-Najera, 26; Jose Diaz-Gutierrez, 36, were questioned, and a drug-detection dog alerted officers to drugs in the car, two packages of "cyrstalline substance" that tested positive for meth, the affidavit said.

The four were arrested Thursday and jailed on suspicion of conspiracy to possess with the intent to distribute methamphetamine, said Natalie Collins, spokeswoman with the Nevada U.S. attorney's office.