Almost three years after a major drug-trafficking bust in Salt Lake City, more than 30 members of the Norteños street gang were sentenced to prison, the U.S. Attorney’s Office announced Tuesday.
Sandy-based kingpin Joseph Gomez was sentenced to serve 14 years in federal prison by a U.S. District Court judge on Dec. 7. Gomez pleaded guilty to conspiracy to distribute methamphetamine and conspiracy to launder money.
Another 31 members of the gang pleaded guilty to charges Dec. 7, and most received sentences of between 6 and 8 years in prison, the U.S. Attorney’s Office said. Another four lower-level defendants have yet to be sentenced.
Investigators identified the first Norteños group in the mid-1980s and found several other subsets in the early 1990s. More unaligned street gangs began associating under the Norteños umbrella in the early 2000s, and the Salt Lake Valley has approximately 10 active subsets with around 100 to 150 active members, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office.
The U.S. Attorney’s Office said the gang has been responsible for the sale of heroin and methamphetamine in the Salt Lake area — as well as drive-by shootings, aggravated assaults, robberies and homicides.
“Through a sophisticated and transnational crime-for-profit scheme; gang members brought illegal guns, drugs and violence to our streets,” David Booth, special agent in charge with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF), said in a statement. “This multi-year investigation is proof there are no boundaries of place or time in our pursuit to stop violent crime.”
ATF and the Salt Lake Area Metro Gang Unit began investigating Salt Lake street gangs, including the Norteños, to target drug and firearm sales in June 2018. The Drug Enforcement Administration and the Internal Revenue Service’s Criminal Investigation branch joined the investigation in two months later.
Evidence showed the 32 defendants were involved in a “typical drug-trafficking scheme,” according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office, moving drugs from Mexico and Los Angeles to Salt Lake City, distributing them and collecting money made from the sales.
Investigators found that Gomez and Denny Kandt worked with Mexican drug cartel members to distribute shipments of methamphetamine and heroin to be sold by sub-distributors around the Salt Lake Valley.
The U.S. Attorney’s Office said law enforcement seized more than 30 pounds of methamphetamine, 19 firearms and more than $20,000 in cash during the course of the investigation. The office reported that Norteños trafficked approximately 20 to 30 pounds of methamphetamine to Utah each month.
Federal prosecutors indicted 38 defendants in total as a result of the investigation, with the main indictment involving Gomez, Kandt and the 30 other defendants sentenced last week.
“This prosecution highlights the high-level narcotics distribution networks that target our state and our communities, along with the law enforcement partnerships that enable us to dismantle drug trafficking organizations from the cartel level down to street dealers,” Acting United States Attorney Andrea T. Martinez said in a statement.
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