EAST ST. LOUIS, Ill. - After a week-long trial, a federal jury returned a guilty verdict convicting
a California man of Conspiracy to Possess with Intent to Deliver Controlled Substances.
Arturo Ledesma, Jr., 33, of Watsonville, CA, was charged in a superseding indictment on December
10, 2019, with Conspiracy to Distribute and Possess with Intent to Distribute Controlled Substances
between January 2017 and May of 2018. The jury heard evidence that Ledesma supplied marijuana and
methamphetamine to co-conspirators in California and Pennsylvania starting in 2017. In May of 2018,
co-conspirators were arrested in Madison County, Illinois, while they trafficked more than 30
pounds of methamphetamine across the country.
Sentencing will be held on Sept. 19, 2022, before the Honorable Chief Judge Nancy
Rosenstengel.
Co-Defendants Enrique Vazquez and Dastisha Velez of Reading, Pennsylvania; Mitchell Abreu of
Pawtucket, Rhode Island; Jeremy Inderyas of Brooklyn, New York; and Lauren Korn of Basking Ridge,
New Jersey, have all previously pled guilty to their roles in this drug conspiracy.
The Illinois State Police (ISP); the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA); the Bureau of Alcohol,
Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF); the Internal Revenue Service (IRS); and the United States
Marshal Service (USMS) participated in this investigation.
This case was 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.
Assistant United States Attorneys Daniel Kapsak, John Trippi, and Amanda Fischer prosecuted the
case.
Source: U.S. Department of Justice, Office of the United States Attorneys
