Soldier at a Colorado nightclub during an immigration raid charged with distributing cocaine
DENVER (AP) — A soldier present at an after-hours nightclub where more than 100 immigrants suspected of being in the U.S. illegally were taken into custody last weekend has been charged with distributing cocaine, court records show.
Staff Sgt. Juan Gabriel Orona-Rodriguez, who is assigned to Fort Carson, an Army post near the illegal club in Colorado Springs, was arrested Wednesday evening, the FBI said in a statement.
The arrest came after an investigation by the DEA, the Department of the Army Criminal Investigation Division and officials at Fort Carson, the FBI said.
Orona-Rodriquez, a member of the 1st Stryker Brigade Combat Team in the 4th Infantry Division, has been charged with conspiracy to distribute cocaine and distribution and possession with intent to distribute cocaine after allegedly selling cocaine to an undercover DEA agent sometime during the week before the raid, according to an arrest affidavit.
It wasn't immediately known if the soldier has a lawyer, but he was expected to appear in court later Thursday.
More than 300 law enforcement officers and officials from multiple agencies participated in Sunday's operation at the nightclub, which had been under investigation for months for alleged activities including drug trafficking, prostitution and 'crimes of violence,' said Jonathan Pullen, special agent in charge of the DEA's Rocky Mountain Division.
Cocaine was among the drugs found, Pullen said at a news conference.
Orona-Rodriquez was one of about 17 active-duty U.S. Army service members who were at the club, known as Warike, when it was raided early Sunday, the affidavit said.
He appears to have held a leadership role in a business that provides armed security at nightclubs, including at Warike, according to the document. However, it did not say whether he was working security there at the time of the raid. It notes that he had been warned by his commanding officer this spring that he could not work for the security company.
Of the 17 soldiers who were at the venue at the time of the raid, 16 were patrons and one was working there in a security role, a U.S. official said on the condition of anonymity to provide details not yet made public. Sixteen of the soldiers there were assigned to Fort Carson, the official did not know where the seventeenth was assigned.
Investigators suspect Orona-Rodriguez was getting cocaine from an unidentified Mexican citizen who is 'unlawfully present in the United States without admission,' according to the affidavit.
President Donald Trump posted a link to the DEA video of the raid on his social media site, Truth Social. 'A big Raid last night on some of the worst people illegally in our Country — Drug Dealers, Murderers, and other Violent Criminals, of all shapes and sizes,' the president wrote.
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Associated Press writer Tara Copp in Washington, D.C., contributed to this report.
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