Susan T. Lehr, U.S. Attorney | U.S. Attorney for the District of Nebraska
Luis Avelar, a 28-year-old resident of Omaha, Nebraska, has been sentenced to over 21 years in federal prison for his involvement in a methamphetamine distribution conspiracy. The sentence was handed down by United States District Judge Brian C. Buescher on January 22, 2025. Following his release from prison, Avelar will be subject to five years of supervised release.
Avelar's activities came under scrutiny beginning in 2020 when Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) agents identified him as a suspect in meth distribution within the Omaha area. On March 11, 2020, he was observed leaving an apartment with a backpack from which a confidential source later purchased one pound of methamphetamine from another individual. An attempt by another confidential source to purchase half a pound of meth from Avelar on April 18, 2023, failed when the supplier refused to sell less than one pound.
On December 30, 2023, DEA agents interviewed Avelar at the Douglas County Jail where he admitted his role in distributing methamphetamine since starting in Omaha in 2020. He confessed to selling approximately four or five pounds of meth on behalf of a Mexico-based drug supplier and renting a storage unit for storing the drug. After an associate was apprehended at a hotel with drugs, Avelar cleared out the storage unit and delivered about ten pounds of meth to an accomplice's residence.
Investigators verified that Avelar rented the storage unit between November 7 and November 23, 2022. Surveillance footage confirmed his presence at the facility on November 23—the same day Bellevue police arrested someone with eleven pounds of methamphetamine at a motel.
The case was investigated by the Drug Enforcement Administration as part of an Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Forces (OCDETF) operation aimed at dismantling high-level criminal organizations threatening national security through coordinated efforts among various agencies.
