A Mexican citizen residing in Renton, Washington, has been sentenced to an additional five years in prison for a second drug trafficking conviction. Humberto Lopez Rodriguez, 31, was previously given a five-year sentence but failed to report to federal prison. He was arrested in December 2023 while transporting 13 kilograms of cocaine and carrying a loaded gun in a vehicle traveling from California to Washington.
At the sentencing hearing, U.S. District Judge Tana Lin ordered that the new sentence run consecutively with his previous term. Judge Lin told Lopez Rodriguez: “You committed this crime after you failed to surrender to corrections…. You’ll be deported after serving your sentence and the American Dream is dead for you.”
Acting U.S. Attorney Teal Luthy Miller commented on the case: “This defendant continued to deal drugs while on pretrial release and later was arrested in a car with a drug load when he should have been serving his federal sentence. Such conduct – ignoring our laws and criminal justice system – appropriately results in additional prison time.”
Lopez Rodriguez’s charges stem from an extensive investigation into drug traffickers connected to Mexico and Colombia. In June 2024, law enforcement agencies including the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), Seattle Police Department, and IRS Criminal Investigation executed 24 search or arrest warrants related to this operation. By that time, Lopez Rodriguez had already been incarcerated following his arrest six months earlier.
Throughout the investigation, authorities seized large quantities of illegal substances—84,000 fentanyl pills, over one kilogram of fentanyl powder, 32 kilograms of cocaine, 15 kilograms of methamphetamine, nearly three kilograms of heroin—as well as 18 firearms and $71,000 believed to be proceeds from drug sales.
Of the sixteen defendants charged as part of this investigation, five have pleaded guilty so far. Ramon Duarte Garcia received a ten-year sentence in May 2025; Curtis McDaniel was sentenced to five years; Jose Luis Villafañe Osorio has pleaded guilty with sentencing scheduled for August; Manuel Garcia Hernandez also pleaded guilty with sentencing set for September.
Prosecutors highlighted recent overdose statistics in King County when requesting a six-year term for Lopez Rodriguez: “Indeed, drug overdoses resulted in 1,044 deaths in King County in 2024. Through not quite seven months of 2025, there have been 541 confirmed overdose deaths, with another 47 suspected overdose deaths. Though fentanyl gets the lion’s share of attention with respect to overdose deaths—and rightly so―cocaine was the third most common drug involved in overdose deaths in King County in 2024. Specifically, cocaine was involved in 26% of overdose deaths―often in combination with fentanyl.”
The case is part of Operation Take Back America—a nationwide Justice Department initiative targeting illegal immigration and transnational criminal organizations through combined efforts such as Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Forces (OCDETF) and Project Safe Neighborhoods (PSN).
The DEA and Seattle Police Department are leading the ongoing investigation with support from several other agencies including local police departments from Renton and Centralia; Homeland Security Investigations; HUD Office of Inspector General; Washington State Patrol; Pierce County SWAT; Valley SWAT teams; as well as Colombian law enforcement partners.
Assistant United States Attorneys Joe Silvio and C. Andrew Colasurdo are prosecuting these cases for the Western District of Washington.
