Interstate pot trafficking investigation broadens
An interstate marijuana trafficking operation with Santa Barbara ties that was busted up in early January blossomed into a much larger investigation that culminated with the arrests of 31 people in Florida, Santa Barbara County Sheriff officials said.
Local authorities became aware of the marijuana trafficking ring on Jan. 5 when Kenneth Koster, 46, was arrested in Canadian County, Okla. Authorities said he originated in Santa Barbara and was making his way to Florida with 33 pounds of marijuana.
After hearing of Koster’s arrest, local authorities obtained three search warrants, one for Koster’s residence, one for a business in Goleta and another for a home in the 1700 block of Glen Annie Rd.
Investigators arrested three people while serving the search warrants, and seized 130 marijuana plants, $27,000 cash and about $10,000 in marijuana growing equipment.
Among those arrested was 37-year-old George Foxx, who was eventually released on bail.
Koster too was freed after posting bail. However, both Foxx and Koster are now wanted in Seminole County, Fla., where many of the 31 arrests were made. After learning of a $500,000 warrant out of Florida, Santa Barbara County Sheriff’s deputies arrested Koster, who is awaiting extradition to Seminole County. Foxx remains at large and is wanted on felony marijuana smuggling, money laundering and racketeering charges.
Police said Foxx was the main California contact and source of marijuana that was shuttled back east, where it was sold for $4,300 to $4,500 per pound.
The sophisticated trafficking operation has shed light on the ways California’s semi-legal status for marijuana is creating problems for other states where the drug remains flatly illegal.
Officials said much of the marijuana cultivated in Santa Barbara and Humboldt counties for the trafficking ring was being produced under the guise of Proposition 215, which legalized the drug for medicinal use.
“Through the investigation, agents determined that California, due to their Proposition 215 that permits the growing of marijuana for medical use is being exploited by drug trafficking organizations throughout Central Florida,” a news release from the Seminole County Sheriff’s Department said.
According to the news release, Foxx acted as a broker to arrange drug transactions between Central Florida organizations and growers in California.
After Koster was arrested in Oklahoma, the drug traffickers took to the air, hiring a pilot who flew from Florida, landed at an airport “on the South Coast of Santa Barbara County,” according to a sheriff’s department spokesman, where the plane was loaded with marijuana and flown back to Central Florida.
Florida officials said drug dealers there were paying about $2,400 per pound, and were selling about $90,000 in marijuana per week, for about double what they were paying. At the rate of $4,500 per pound, drug dealers were moving approximately 20 pounds a week.
Along with the 31 arrests in Florida, Seminole County authorities have seized 600 pounds of high-grade marijuana, one-half of a pound of cocaine, 27 vehicles and about $700,000 cash.
Drew Sugars, a Santa Barbara County Sheriff’s Department spokesman, said the lucrative drug trafficking operation was hardly the sort of activity made legal by Proposition 215.
“Our contention is that they’re dealing in illegal trafficking of marijuana,” he said. “The law was written to benefit seriously ill people. [If] we think anyone out there is breaking the law, our detectives are going to go out and get them.”
Comment on this article
medical marijuana is a ruse : 3/11/2010
and so is the pseudo dealer green well and cannamed that are advertising right next to my typing. Grow recommendation up to 99 plants????? WTF? So now Florida is tasting our craziness, and so will other states. The only answer is to repeal 215, this is just drug dealing and trafficking using a law that was meant for perhaps a very few. The traffickers will blow it for the sick. Stupid pot heads.
Sick of pot in SB, and all that comes with it
: 3/11/2010
I love pot. I come home from work, smoke a little pot and relax for the evening. I feel great. I can still read, pay bills, whatever. No beer belly, no thick head in the morning. I guess Mr. sick of pot would like to see me go back to criminal status for my pot use. Ridiculous.
: 3/11/2010
Alcohol causes how many deaths and injuries on the roads each year? And contributes to how many other accidents off the roads, i.e. firearms, domestic violence, battery, etc? We legalized alcohol a long time ago, and we don't have drug cartels and smugglers coming from Mexico to supply it. Therefore, it makes sense that legalizing marijuana would have the same result–ending the smuggling crime. And how often does one read in the papers that auto accidents were caused by "marijuana intoxication" rather than "alcohol intoxication"? Never. I think the worst thing that will happen with legalizing marijuana will be that some people will overindulge and find themselves unable to get off their couches amidst the cookie crumbs.
$700,000.00 plus : 3/11/2010
You guys are in the wrong business.
they net $700,000.00 plus
time to change jobs.
Leglization NOT the answer : 3/11/2010
Alcohol does terrible damage to families and individuals, and results in fatal car accidents. Agreed. And this is 80+ years after legalization. So your answer is to ADD to this by legalizing marijuana.
Not a convincing argument, I must say.
Let me also add there is a prohibition on rape and murder, and we're clearly not winning the war on those either, but the answer is hardly 'legalize it' and all the problems go away...
I find it terrible what's happening in Mexico with all the cartel murders, beheadings, and craziness. And, they decriminalized marijuana. What a winning decision that was!
Pot rots
Somebody doesn't read much, then : 3/11/2010
if you think marijuana never results in deaths:
Bicyclist killed: Richard House was driving a Fed Ex truck in Enid, OK, the evening of Aug. 5, 2009, when he told police the heat got to him and he fell asleep, striking and killing Don Riggs, who was riding his bicycle with friends, according to the affidavit.
House told police he must have “dozed off,” and the next thing he heard was a loud bang and another person on the roadway scream for him to stop, the affidavit states. A blood sample was taken from House following the accident and was later submitted to the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation’s Forensic Science Center for testing. It tested positive for marijuana, according to an OSBI criminalist report.
Oakland: Adrian Landers was driving a Ford F-150 pickup truck east on Doolittle Drive at about 5:30 p.m. Saturday when he a ran a red light at Hegenberger Road and struck a Pontiac G6 heading toward the airport in Oakland
Boxdell, a passenger in the Pontiac, was pronounced dead at the scene. The driver of the Pontiac, a 27-year-old Richmond woman, was hospitalized with non-life-threatening injuries. Her name was not released.
Landers was suspected of driving under the influence and was taken to a hospital with non-life-threatening injuries. Officers found a "large quantity of marijuana" inside the truck.
And then John Patrick Bedell opened fire on the Pentagon, a medical marijuana patient from California.
Oh yea, marijuana kills.
No you can't have your pot and eat it too
The police will now loose their jobs : 3/11/2010
The police will now loose their jobs because the County/City/State/Country are out of money (no more revenue).
The cops could work together with the growers and dealers, split the profits, and pocket the cash left over, it's a win-win situation. Any additional excess could be used to fund the war efforts.
re: No you can't have your pot and eat it too : 3/11/2010
Get a grip. Marijuana does not kill people, people kill people.
Marijuana can be detected for up to 30 days after use. So just because someone has THC is their system doesn't mean that they're HIGH you moron!
As far as the pentagon shooter goes, he went off of his prescribe medication suffering from depression, and tried to use marijuana as it's place. The guy obviously had some mental issues that caused him to go target shooting at the pentagon. Marijuana has nothing to do with it. Do you remember when some young teen boys committed suicide because they were listening to Judas Priest?....well it wasn't Judas Priest's fault.
It just baffles me that ignorant people blame marijuana for everything.
Sick of The Ignorance
Bah, bah, bah... : 3/11/2010
It's entertaining to listen to the verbal diarreha of the new pothead coalition here in Snata Barbara... Go back to northern Cal ! It's interesting to watch kids pile out of truck in the Denny's parking lot and then send one of their buddies over to the pot shop down the street to score the weed. What a joke!
: 3/11/2010
At least they were white
Drink beer : 3/13/2010
Hops are the flowers of the Humulus lupulus plant, a member of the hemp family. Humulus lupulus grow on both coasts of the US, and in Europe. Hops are an essential ingredient in beer because they contain slightly to very bitter essential oils that help to give beer, ale and the like its tang.
Hemp is another word for cannabis
: 3/13/2010
In Beer Hops and Barley are manipulated by man to make beer. Marijuana can be used without man made manipulation.
: 3/17/2010
Legalize, tax and regulate!! The sooner California goes fully legal, the sooner people will finally get to see that it will actually work and us folks here in central Florida and the rest of the nation might have a chance the reaching the same dream and hopefully not wasting away in prison at the taxpayer's expense. California residents, you need to vote this fall!
OrlandoTom
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