Authorities seized more than seven pounds of heroin and police arrested two men after a traffic stop turned into a massive narcotics bust Monday in North Carolina.
Officials with the Tar River Regional Drug Task Force made the arrests after a year-long investigation into the flow of heroin into Nash, Edgecombe and Halifax counties. Tony Reams and Herbert Lamont Cherry were stopped in Halifax County by police, who found them carrying 3,460 grams or roughly seven and a half pounds of heroin with an estimated street value of about $347,000, reports The Wilson Times.
Officers found the heroin wrapped in 694 bricks consisting of 34,700 bindles, ready for distribution in the region.
“It’s a good day when you look at the amount of drugs seized and the traffickers arrested before their poison can be distributed in our communities,” Nash County Sheriff Keith Stone said in a statement Monday.
Cherry and Reams are charged with two counts each of trafficking in opium, heroin or opiates and are being held on $30,000 bond. The Tar River Regional Drug Task Force also announced the arrests of 15 people Monday on drugs and weapons charges in connection to the illicit narcotics trade.
The heroin death rate spiked by 46 percent in North Carolina between 2014 and 2015.
Police are making recent headway against major trafficking operations feeding addiction in the U.S. A two-year investigation by officials in Pennsylvania dubbed “Operation Crushed Ice” recently ended in 49 arrests. The drug ring extended across the U.S. from the Delaware Valley to Arizona and even Puerto Rico.
Police seized undisclosed amounts of methamphetamine, heroin, cocaine, marijuana and prescription narcotics during a number of raids conducted in January.
Authorities in Illinois made sweeping drug arrests March 9, charging 65 people for distributing heroin, fentanyl and cocaine in the West Side of Chicago. Over the course of the investigation, known as “Operation Sweet Dreams,” authorities seized more than a dozen firearms, more than three kilograms of heroin, three kilograms of cocaine and more than $380,000 in cash.
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