SCRANTON- The United States Attorney’s Office for the Middle District of Pennsylvania announced today that Edgar Mendoza, age 29, formerly of Drums, Pennsylvania, was sentenced by United States District Judge Malachy E. Mannion, to 108 months’ imprisonment for methamphetamine trafficking.
According to United States Attorney John C. Gurganus, on July 23, 2021, Mendoza pleaded guilty to conspiring with several other individuals to distribute and possess with intent to distribute between 5 and 15 kilograms of methamphetamine in the Hazleton area between October 2019 and February 2020. Mendoza also pleaded guilty to conspiring with several other individuals to launder drug proceeds. During the scheme, conspirators mailed parcels containing methamphetamine from Arizona to Luzerne County, Pennsylvania, for retrieval and distribution. Mendoza was involved in retrieving parcels, selling the methamphetamine and depositing drug proceeds into a bank account in furtherance of the drug trafficking conspiracy.
The methamphetamine trafficking case was investigated by Homeland Security Investigations, the U.S. Postal Inspection Service, and the Pennsylvania Attorney General’s Office as part of an Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Forces (OCDETF) operation. OCDETF identifies, disrupts, and dismantles the highest-level criminal organizations that threaten the United States using a prosecutor-led, intelligence-driven, multi-agency approach. Additional information about the OCDETF Program can be found at https://www.justice.gov/OCDETF.
The case was prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Jenny P. Roberts.
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