Authorities said they have disrupted the flow of methamphetamine in the metro area with the arrests of 77 people and the seizure of drugs, cash and guns in Adams County.
North Metro Task Force officers and agents from the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration searched eight homes, including three in Denver, and made 38 arrests Thursday morning as part of “Operation Tattletale,” which is focused on the LPP prison gang and its associates.
Those arrests included 13 people who had been identified as primary targets in the investigation.
The arrests were made immediately following the grand jury indictment that was returned Tuesday night.
The indictment is sealed — not all of the 45 people listed in it have been arrested — but includes 230 counts, including charges of racketeering under Colorado Organized Crime Control Act, as well as kidnapping, motor vehicle theft, robbery and menacing.
The LPP gang, or the Los Primeros Padres, started as a prison gang. As associates were released from jail, they began importing methamphetamine and cocaine from Mexico and selling it across the north metro area.
North Metro Task Force commander Jerry Peters said the group’s operation had just started when the investigation was launched about nine months ago.
Seventeenth Judicial District Attorney Dave Young said 15 wiretaps were used in the investigation. The probe required a balancing act of gathering information while also stopping dangerous crime as it happened.
“This was a complicated case,” Peters said. “There was a lot of street violence that occurred with this group. We had to do something.”
Although law enforcement would not elaborate on the nature of many of the charges, they did talk about car thefts.
Peters said the group would steal cars — many that were left running and unattended in the cold mornings — and then sell or swap them to fund the drugs they were importing. He said 36 stolen cars were recovered during the investigation.
During the investigation, law enforcement made 77 arrests and seized 20 guns including assault rifles and sawed-off shotguns.
Several pounds of methamphetamine and cocaine were seized as well as more than $80,000 in cash.
Peters said the seized meth was found in the form of large ice crystals that tested at a 99 percent purity level.
Peters said meth typically tested at about 40 percent pure 15 years ago. More recently, during the meth lab boom in Colorado, the drug was being found at about 75 to 85 percent purity.
“There is still a lot of meth in Colorado, and it has come back in the last couple of years,” Peters said.
Commerce City Police Chief Troy Smith said everyone is safer as a result of the investigation.
“These people demonstrated a complete disregard for human life,” Smith said. “These people participated in police pursuits. They shot at officers, and one of my detectives was seriously injured during the course of this investigation.”
Details about the incident in which the Commerce City detective was injured were not disclosed, other than that it occurred in February and remains an open investigation out of Douglas County. The detective has not returned to duty.
Sadie Gurman: 303-954-1661, sgurman@denverpost.com or
