Budget cuts to impact county's drug task force
By Michelle Knight knight@theacorn.com

JANN HENDRY/Acorn Newspapers OFF THE STREET- Capt. Derek West with the Ventura County Sheriff's Department points to narcotics and weapons that members of the drug task force seized during three drug busts between December 2007 to February 2008. West, a Camarillo resident, heads the multi-agency task force and said at a press conference last week in Ventura that the narcotics bureau is in jeopardy of losing 67 percent of its budget because of federal cutbacks.

A Ventura County narcotics task force has taken weapons and millions of dollars worth of drugs off the streets in a twoyear, multi-agency investigation that has resulted in multiple arrests in Ventura and Los Angeles counties.

Task force leaders worry that federal cutbacks could cripple future largescale narcotics investigations, said a captain with the Ventura County Sheriff 's Department during a press conference last week at the Ventura County Government Center.

From December 2007 to February 2008, investigators with the Ventura County Combined Agency Team arrested several residents of Los Angeles and Ventura counties in three drug busts that all originated in Ventura County.

Drug agents seized a combined total of 131 pounds of black tar heroine, 56 pounds of methamphetamines, rock and powder cocaine, and "a smorgasbord of designer-type drugs," including Ecstasy and "the date rape drug" GHB, said Ventura County Sheriff's Capt. Derek West, who heads the task force.

West said the purity of the heroin and methamphetamines is thought to be as high as 70 percent, and they could have been cut multiple times before reaching the streets.

He said the black tar heroin could have been cut into about 600,000 doses with a street value of $3.5 million.

Investigators also seized more than $600,000 in cash, several handguns and an AK-47 semiautomatic machine gun, West said.

The Ventura County Combined Agency Team comprises the Sheriff 's Department, Ventura County district attorney's office, the Oxnard Police Department and the federal Drug Enforcement Administration. Additional law enforcement agencies were included in the investigations as needed.

Ventura County Sheriff Bob Brooks said drug distribution of the three cases could well have gone past state lines. He praised the work of the task force but said the federal budget threatens to cut funding to such task forces by 67 percent, severely hampering these types of largescale drug investigations.

The task force stands to lose $189,000 of its $283,000 federal grant money, West said. The money offsets the cost of investigations and prosecution, and pays for equipment and training for investigators.

"You take away our funding, and we have to go back to working street drugs," West said.

Included among those arrested are Oxnard residents Julio Herrera Ramirez, 47, and his 20-year-old son Julio Lucas Ramirez in February. The elder Ramirez could face up to 44 years in prison. His son has pleaded guilty to conspiring to sell drugs and faces up to seven years in state prison, said Ventura County District Attorney Greg Totten.

Task force officials said the arrest of the Ramirezes and others takes out the middle rungs of a sophisticated drug network that required a multiagency approach. Although drug trafficking in Ventura and Los Angeles counties is likely to continue without them it will have a much harder time, they said.