Mexican National Sentenced to Prison for Armed Drug Trafficking

          A 40-year-old Vancouver, Washington resident was sentenced this week in U.S. District Court in Tacoma to 80 months in prison for drug and gun crimes, announced U.S. Attorney Annette L. Hayes. IGNACIO MAGANA MONTES, aka SOSTENES MONTOYA SANCHEZ, aka “Nacho,” pleaded guilty in April 2017, to Possession of Heroin with Intent to Distribute, and Possession of a Firearm in Furtherance of a Drug Trafficking Crime. MAGANA MONTES is a Mexican national who likely will be deported following his prison term. At the sentencing hearing, U.S. District Judge Benjamin H. Settle noted that the large amount of drugs and cash seized at MAGANA MONTES’ home demonstrated that he had been a sizable dealer for some time, and had contributed to the opioid epidemic gripping our state and nation.

          According to records filed in the case, in September 2015, the Vancouver Police Department executed a search warrant on MAGANA MONTES’s home in the 2300 block of Neals Lane, in Vancouver. Inside a locked closet in the master bedroom, law enforcement seized a Jennings .22 caliber pistol, a Llama .45 caliber pistol, about a dozen cell phones, over $112,000 in cash, and an ounce of heroin. In the garage of the home officers recovered three pounds of heroin (one pound was packaged for distribution), and in a lock box buried just outside the garage they found another two pounds of heroin. In all, law enforcement seized more than five pounds of heroin and $128,000 from the house.

          In their sentencing memo prosecutors noted that MAGANA MONTES is a large-scale dealer, given the amount of money and drugs in the home. The five pounds of heroin could provide upwards of 20,000 individual doses of heroin. Law enforcement searched the house and discovered the drug trafficking operation after family members were involved in a nearby drive-by shooting incident in Vancouver, and thereafter returned to the family home. It is unclear whether that shooting was drug related.

          The case was investigated by the Vancouver Police Department and the FBI. The case was prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorney Gregory A. Gruber.