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Four men from the Rio Grande Valley have been sentenced for narcotics trafficking and selling drugs that left one man dead following a transaction, according to the United States Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of Texas.
McAllen residents Gabriel Ortiz, 31, Francisco Ortiz, 53, and Adbento Guerrero, 62, as well as Edinburg resident Alonzo Rolando Garza, 42, have all previously pleaded guilty.
Gabriel Ortiz was sentenced to 12 years in prison while Francisco Ortiz received a 10-year sentence, according to a news release from the USAO.
Guerrero and Garza were previously sentenced to over two years and 10 years in prison, respectively.
The quartet will also serve five years of supervised release following their sentences.
“Gabriel Ortiz and his co-conspirators, with their irresponsible and criminal behavior, directly caused the death of a human being,” U.S. Attorney Alamdar S. Hamdani said in the release. “This case demonstrates the dangers of local drug dealing and narcotics usage.”
An investigation revealed that the four men trafficked cocaine in the McAllen and Edinburg areas between 2019 and 2020. The release states the co-conspirators would buy and sell multi-kilogram quantities of cocaine and smaller amounts of cocaine base, also known as “crack.”
According to the release, Gabriel Ortiz sold about three grams of cocaine base to a 53-year-old man who died after using the narcotic in November 2020.
In July 2019, the Edinburg Police Department began receiving information related to the drug trafficking activities of Gabriel Ortiz from a “reliable confidential source,” according to a criminal complaint.
The source said that Gabriel Ortiz would sell both powder cocaine and crack cocaine.
On Oct. 21, 2019, Edinburg detectives devised a plan with the source to conduct a controlled purchase of crack cocaine.
The source placed a recorded call with Ortiz where they arranged the transaction. The source was under surveillance and supervision by the detectives when the transaction of an undisclosed amount of crack cocaine was made.
The crack was tested and tagged as evidence.
On Sept. 11, 2020, detectives conducted another controlled purchase of crack using the same process as before and tagging the narcotics as evidence once more.
Between Oct. 2019 and Sept. 2020, 42.3 grams of crack cocaine was sold between Gabriel Ortiz and the confidential course, according to the complaint.
In the end, law enforcement had a combined estimated street value of about $260,000 in narcotics.
According to the release, law enforcement also seized $294,520 in money and assets as part of the case.
