A convicted felon and a man not in the United States legally face charges for possessing a narcotics and loaded guns.
The U.S. Department of Justice said Benjamin Alberto Lozoya, a convicted felon, and Arturo Carreno-Rivera, of Mexico, face federal charges after a drug bust in Norcross.
Lozoya and Carreno-Rivera were found with 30 pounds of fentanyl, 10 pounds of methamphetamine and two loaded guns during a drug trafficking operation, federal officials said.
“The defendants conducted their alleged narcotics trafficking in public with no fear of being caught,” U.S. Attorney Theodore S. Hertzberg said in a statement.
According to the U.S. Attorney’s Office, Lozoya was seen selling more than four pounds of meth to someone in a Norcross parking lot.
Agents from the Drug Enforcement Administration followed him to a trailer home nearby and while watching, saw Lozoya go to a shed, walk to another suspected drug transaction, then give roughly $11,000 in cash to a waiting vehicle.
Lozoya was arrested and agents found a stolen loaded handgun in his pocket, six pounds of meth in his backpack and over 18 pounds of purple fentanyl bricks and 25 pounds of a white crystalline substance officials said was “consistent in appearance with methamphetamine.”
The same afternoon, DEA agents watched Carreno-Rivera conduct an alleged drug sale with someone at a gas station in Norcross.
A Georgia State Patrol trooper performed a traffic stop and found a pound of fentanyl in his car.
When agents executed a search warrant at Carreno-Rivera’s home in Norcross, they found 11 more pounds of fentanyl and a loaded semi-automatic handgun.