Jose Uriel Arreola-Ortiz
Chester County District Attorney Tom Hogan announced Thursday the arrest of Jose Uriel Arreola–Ortiz for drug trafficking. The defendant reportedly supplied a confidential informant with a kilogram of crystal methamphetamine and a half kilogram of fentanyl-laced heroin.
Arreola–Ortiz allegedly ran a drug operation out of Mexico and California, supplying drugs in bulk to Southern Chester County for resale at street level. He was arrested last night in Oxford when he flew out to pick up a payment for the drugs.
“As a matter of self-defense, Chester County law enforcement has been forced to play on a larger stage to prevent drug dealers from injecting their poison into our county,”District Attorney Hogan said. “There was a time when we were satisfied to pick off ounces of illegal drugs from local dealers. Now, we have the capacity and skill to interdict kilograms from international drug traffickers. We will never quit.”
Hogans office said that Arreola-Ortiz is a Mexican national residing illegally in the United States.
His last known address in the United States was 1625 East 2ih Street, Merced, California. He is 27 years old.
Investigators said that Arreola-Ortiz is part of a drug-trafficking organization with ties to Mexico and California. In March of 2019, he reportedly appeared in Chester County to collect on a drug debt for marijuana sales. At that time, Hogan said, Arreola-Ortiz was introduced to a confidential informant (“CI”) working with the Chester County Detectives.
He allegedly set up a deal to send the CI a kilogram of crystal methamphetamine for resale. Arreola-Ortiz reportedly instructed the CI to deposit money into a bank account under a false name.
Once the money was deposited, investors said that Arreola-Ortiz mailed a kilogram of methamphetamine to the CI on March 28, 2019. He allegedly later spoke to the CI to confirm the quality of the meth and arranged for another payment to the bank account.
Officials say that Arreola-Ortiz and the CI then engaged in a series of communications. He allegedly offered to sell the CI both meth and heroin. Arreola-Ortiz also reportedly had the CI deposit money into another bank account under a second fake name.
On August 29, 2019, the CI received a half-kilogram package from the Arreola-Ortiz, investigators said. The package was supposed to contain heroin. Instead, it allegedly contained mostly fentanyl, mixed with heroin. Such a shipment could have caused dozens of overdose deaths if sold to users in Chester County, officials said.
On Wednesday, Arreola-Ortiz travelled to Chester County to reportedly receive payment from the CI. Instead, he was met by Chester County Detectives and arrested on drug trafficking charges.
Arreola-Ortiz’s bail was set at $1 million cash. He was remanded to Chester County Prison. He will have a preliminary hearing scheduled shortly.
“Crystal meth and fentanyl laced heroin are the evil twins of current street drugs,” Hogan said. “The world is a dark place where we can order up a kilo of meth and a half-kilo of heroin/fentanyl this easily. However, as local drug dealers and now international drug traffickers are learning, they better stay out of Chester County.”
This case was investigated by the Chester County Detectives, the investigative arm of the District Attorney’s Office, with assistance from the Liberty Mid–AtlanticHIDTA strike force. The assigned prosecutor is Michelle Barone, the head of the DA’s Drug Unit.
