The complaint alleges that the drugs were supplied by a Mexican drug trafficking organization controlled by Mexican Mafia member Martin Madrigal-Cazares. Local street gangs allegedly communicated with the head of the organization in Mexico, while controlling narcotics sales and collecting “taxes” on behalf of the Mexican Mafia in Ventura County.
In the third phase of Operation “SuperNova,” a multi-agency task force investigation that targeted Mexican Mafia-affiliated street gangs in Ventura County, 17 people have been charged following an investigation by a task force comprised of the FBI, the Ventura Police Department and the Oxnard Police Department. Following arrests Wednesday morning, 14 of 17 defendants named in a federal criminal complaint unsealed are now in custody.
Several teams of police officers and federal agents executed arrest and search warrants and took six defendants into custody without incident. Eight of the 17 defendants charged were already in custody based on unrelated charges and soon will be brought into federal custody.
The remaining three defendants charged in the complaint are fugitives, some believed to be residing in Mexico, where they allegedly direct the narcotics-trafficking activity alleged in the complaint.
The criminal complaint details a year-long undercover investigation and outlines a series of narcotics transactions that led to the seizure of more than two pounds of methamphetamine and quantities of heroin that were being sold on the streets of Ventura County.
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