2 Caught Allegedly Smuggling Heroin At LAX

LOS ANGELES, CA -- Two men are expected to face a federal judge on June 8 on charges of attempting to smuggle heroin worth nearly $500,000 on commercial flights leaving Los Angeles International Airport.

Cristian Santos, 21, of Compton, was arrested Tuesday at LAX by special agents with the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration after boarding a Delta Airlines flight, according to the U.S. Attorney's Office. DEA agents also arrested Joel Aron, 18, of Tijuana, Mexico, after he boarded a Hawaiian Airlines flight at LAX on the same day.

The suspects -- charged in separate federal criminal complaints filed Tuesday in Los Angeles -- apparently do not know each other.

Prosecutors allege that narcotics were discovered in Santos' luggage after he checked in for an Indianapolis-bound flight. After seeing something suspicious in one of the bags during an image scan, Transportation Security Administration officers inspected the bag, and discovered an item that resembled a flattened pillow wrapped with black electrical tape, concealed inside the inner layer of the luggage, the complaint alleges.

After a TSA bomb detection officer determined that the package inside the bag was not an explosive, the parcel was found to contain a substance resembling brown tar, later determined to be heroin with a street value of $250,000, prosecutors contend.

Los Angeles Airport Police located Santos on his Delta Airlines flight, and escorted him off the airplane. During a subsequent interview, Santos admitted that the luggage belonged to him, and that he was working as a courier in exchange for cash, prosecutors allege.

Narcotics were also allegedly discovered in Aron's luggage after he checked in for a flight bound for Honolulu.

After seeing something suspicious in one of the bags during an image scan, the TSA team discovered a "mass" at the bottom of the bag which was later determined to be heroin with a street value in Hawaii of $225,000, the complaint alleges.

Airport police located Aron on his Hawaiian Airlines flight, and escorted him off the plane. During a subsequent interview, Aron allegedly admitted to DEA special agents that the luggage belonged to him, and that this was the fourth time he had acted as a courier.

According to the complaint, Aron admitted that, each time he acted as a courier, he would cross the border from Mexico into the United States, and take a Greyhound bus to Los Angeles. Once in Los Angeles, Aron would receive a bag, and fly to Hawaii to deliver the bag to an unidentified male. According to the complaint, Aron would receive $3,000 for each trip.

Santos and Aron were each charged with one federal count of possession with intent to distribute a controlled substance, a felony which carries a possible maximum of 20 years in federal prison.

-- City News Service, photo via Shutterstock