Two more suspects – including a Toledo man – are expected to be transferred into federal custody today from a local group authorities call a major methamphetamine-trafficking organization in Southwest Washington.<\/p>\n
Anthony Wayne Reisbeck, 43, of Toledo and Randy Scott Chalupa, 47, of Longview, will move into the federal court system today; as did Erica Deann Lewis, 34, of Toledo, after her Friday arrest in Toledo, according to detective Sgt. Kevin Tate of the Cowlitz-Wahkiakum Narcotics Task Force.<\/p>\n
The task force is looking at numerous Lewis and Cowlitz County residents as they begin their “second wave” of seeking federal prosecutions for previously locally charged individuals, Tate said.<\/p>\n
Lewis was served a no-bail federal warrant and transferred to Tacoma for arraignment in U.S. District Court, according to Tate.<\/p>\n
“This is an ongoing investigation, much more significant than it might appear to the public at this point,” Tate said this morning.<\/p>\n
The task force alleges the network has primarily been purchasing from Mexican drug traffickers, and also trying to manufacture meth on a small scale.<\/p>\n
The so-called first wave came from arrests in late February and early March, he said. Detectives seized two cars, one registered to Lewis, and found more than a pound of methamphetamine, he said.<\/p>\n
Lewis was later arrested near Gee Cee’s truck stop. Her home and two others in Lewis County were searched on March 25. She was arrested Friday driving near her home, Tate said.<\/p>\n
Lewis County Sheriff’s Office detectives have assisted, he said. The task force is made up of law enforcement officers from the Cowlitz County Sheriff’s Office, Longview Police Department, Kelso Police Department, the Washington State Patrol and as available from Wahkiakum County.<\/p>\n
***<\/p>\n
This news story has been corrected since it was first posted. Randy Scott Chapula’s first name was inadvertently omitted.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Two more suspects – including a Toledo man – are expected to be transferred into federal custody today from a local group authorities call a major methamphetamine-trafficking organization in Southwest Washington. Anthony Wayne Reisbeck, 43, of Toledo and Randy Scott Chalupa, 47, of Longview, will move into the federal court system today; as did Erica […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[9,10],"class_list":["post-162","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news-briefs","tag-by-sharyn-l-decker","tag-news-reporter"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lewiscountysirens.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/162","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lewiscountysirens.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lewiscountysirens.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lewiscountysirens.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lewiscountysirens.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=162"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/lewiscountysirens.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/162\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":169,"href":"https:\/\/lewiscountysirens.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/162\/revisions\/169"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lewiscountysirens.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=162"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lewiscountysirens.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=162"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lewiscountysirens.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=162"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}