By Andria Simmons
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
GWINNET COUNTY, Ga. — The investigation started earlier this year with two low-level undercover drug buys in Gwinnett County, but soon police were “following the food chain” to the top — culminating in the arrests of a Marietta police officer and 28 other alleged members of an international drug-trafficking organization.
The arrests made this week, covering three states and two countries, dismantled all three levels of that organization, from ringleaders to midlevel distributors to street dealers, lawmen said at a Wednesday press conference in Gwinnett.
Police seized more than 65,000 Ecstasy tablets in an investigation centered around metro Atlanta, investigators said.
Special Agent Rod Benson of the Drug Enforcement Agency described the case as “very significant.” District Attorney Danny Porter of Gwinnett County said it was the biggest drug case in the 26 years he has prosecuted in Gwinnett, in terms of the number of arrests and the amount of drugs seized.
A Marietta police officer, Isaac Saleumsy, 30, is among those behind bars after police made arrests in Georgia, Tennessee, California and Ontario, Canada.
Investigators charged Saleumsy with conspiracy to possess Ecstasy with intent to distribute. Authorities said he was a midlevel distributor for the Southeast Asian drug-trafficking ring and was related to some of the other defendants arrested in the case, who are Laotian. They said they found the drug in his Cobb County condo after raiding it Tuesday.
Saleumsy is a two-year veteran on the force. He has been suspended pending termination, the Marietta police department said.
“It is always distressing when we find out an officer is involved in illegal activity,” Marietta Police Chief Dan Flynn said. “We are hoping for a very vigorous prosecution.”
Benson described the drug ring as sophisticated and run with “businesslike efficiency.”
At a two-story pink brick house in Kennesaw, where police arrested two men, a wreath of red and green bells adorned a wood-and-glass front door.
A woman who identified herself only as Sandy said one of the suspects, Tinoy Nguyen, was her father and another, Khamone Luangkhot, was her husband. She loaded two small boys into child seats in the back of a white Lexus GS 300.
She said she was “working on” getting a lawyer and declined to discuss the arrests.
Authorities said they opted to prosecute all 29 suspects in Gwinnett because it is easier to investigate without going through all the bureaucracy of the federal judicial system.
The investigation revealed that smugglers brought Ecstasy produced in Canadian labs over the border into Michigan. The contraband was then transported in hidden car compartments to a “well-established customer base” in metro Atlanta and the Southeast, Benson said.
Brightly colored Ecstasy tablets, stamped with logos of elephants or the Mitsubishi symbol, ended up in the hands of youths in Atlanta-area dance clubs, Benson added, and many were cut with methamphetamine to boost the user’s high.
“I can’t emphasize the importance of removing drugs like this off the street,” Benson said.
Copyright 2007 The Atlanta Journal-Constitution