Albuquerque, Nm – A Federal Grand Jury has accused a man from Navajo, his father and a commercial partner accused that they were executing illegal marijuana culture operations in New Mexico and the Navajo nation to supply the black market.
He accusation It was revealed on Thursday, a week after local and federal authorities raided the house of one of the defendants and two farms in a rural area east of Albuquerque that no longer had a license for the State. The seized articles included 8,500 pounds (3,855 kilograms) of marijuana, some methamphetamine, two firearms, $ 35,000 in cash, illegal pesticides and a bulletproof vest.
The charges against Dineh Benally, 48; Donald Benally, 74; And Irving Rea Yui Lin, 73, from California, include conspiracy to manufacture and distribute marijuana, possession with the intention of distributing and contaminating a protected river route.
Prosecutors described the alleged operation as a shameless criminal company and asked a federal judge to stop men waiting for trial, suggesting in a motion that there was a risk that the defendants flee and that they were a danger to the community.
“The conclusion is that the defendants are drug traffickers who operate in accordance with their own laws, so how can something less than arrest the security of the community or the appearance of the accused in this matter?” Read on the motion.
The phone and email messages that were looking for comments were left on Thursday for the defendants.
Dineh Benally first arrived at the headlines when the cannabis cultivation operations were in the northwest of New Mexico Reduced by federal authorities in 2020. The Department of Justice of Navajo demanded it, which led to a court order stopping those operations.
A group of Chinese immigrant workers also demanded Benally and its associates. The workers affirmed that they were attracted to the north of New Mexico and forced to work long hours cutting marijuana in the Navajo nation, where the growth of the plant is illegal.
Last year, New Mexico Marijuana regulators revoked the license of the growing operation In Torrance County, east of Albuquerque. The regulators raised a fine of $ 1 million, saying that there were about 20,000 mature plants on the site, four times more than the number allowed under the license. The inspectors also found another 20,000 immature plants.
According to the accusation, the company involved the construction of more than 1,100 Cannabis greenhouses, the application for Chinese investors to finance the effort and recruitment of Chinese workers to cultivate crops. Dineh Benally is also accused of approaching the Chief of Police of the Navajo nation in an attempt to bribe it with drug profits to allow marijuana to be grown in tribal lands.
With the armed guards who ensure the farms in tribal lands, the accusation alleges that vacuum sealants were used to package marijuana and Chinese workers transported drugs through state lines.
The defendants are also accused of violating federal clean water standards by installing a dam made of sandbags along the San Juan River to help water the crops. The wells were also drilled to access water.
If it is convicted, the defendants face no less than 10 years and even life imprisonment, prosecutors said.
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