Phone taps, 4 pounds of meth in beer box lead to pleas for Middle Georgia ‘ice’ ring
In the summer of 2018, federal drug cops in Georgia began surveilling a suspected drug-trafficking operation.
A sheriff’s deputy in Butts County, between Macon and Atlanta, pulled over a southbound car for weaving and following too closely. The car was driven by a Warner Robins man named Alex Raymond.
The authorities would later reveal that inside the car, packed inside a Michelob Ultra beer box, were more than four pounds of meth bound for delivery to a Macon man, Albruce “B” Simbel Green Sr.
During the DEA’s probe, Green’s cellphone was tapped and further investigation led to other arrests, including that of an Atlanta-area man accused of shipping the drugs to Macon.
This week in U.S. District Court in Macon, the Atlanta-area man, Jose E. Ordez Avalos, and the Middle Georgia pair pleaded guilty to drug-distribution conspiracy and possession charges.
Green, 40, and Raymond, 43, could be sent to prison for up to 20 years and face $1 million fines when they are sentenced.
“DEA agents and Butts County Sheriff’s deputies intercepted a large quantity of pure ice methamphetamine before it entered the Macon community. I have no doubt their efforts saved lives in Middle Georgia,” Charles E. “Charlie” Peeler, U.S. Attorney for the Middle District of Georgia, said in an emailed statement.
After Green was jailed in connection with the trafficking ring, he was released on bail in April 2019.
Late last year, in November, Bibb County sheriff’s deputies involved in a sting of their own encountered Green.
The deputies were conducting their months-long “Operation Extended Stay” to curtail drug dealing and other crime at a patch of discount motels along Eisenhower Parkway at Interstate 475.
Green, according to records in federal court here, was arrested on charges that included meth trafficking and fleeing and eluding the police.