PORTLAND, Ore. — The lead suspect arrested in a record-setting fentanyl bust in Portland last week was arrested Wednesday afternoon after failing to appear at a court hearing the week before.
According to the Multnomah County Sheriff's Office (MCSO), 23-year-old German Ariel Arteaga-Sanchez, also known Luis Funez, was arrested shortly after 5:30 p.m. during a traffic stop near Southeast 174th Avenue and Southeast Start Street.
Funez was taken into custody at the Multnomah County jail shortly after and is being held on arrest warrants with multiple charges. MCSO worked in partnership with U.S. Marshals Service and Portland Police Bureau to take Funez into custody. He was arraigned on Thursday morning.
At the time he appeared to have been released from jail before prosecutors could file charges and subsequently failed to appear at a court hearing, according to court documents first reported by Willamette Week.
The Multnomah County Sheriff's Office reported Friday that it had arrested three people in connection with Thursday morning raids on two locations, one in Portland and one in Oregon City, and seized more than 52 pounds of powdered fentanyl from the Portland site and more than $30,000 cash from the Oregon City site, among other items.
The three people arrested were Funez, 21-year-old Gerson Isaac Hernandez-Betancurt and 37-year-old Dezirae Ann Torset. Court documents describe Funez as the suspected ringleader, Torset as his girlfriend and Hernandez-Betancurt as an accomplice making deliveries.
All three suspects were booked in Multnomah County jail, but court documents indicate the Funez was quickly released and then failed to appear at a subsequent court hearing.
In an affidavit of probable cause in support of Hernandez-Betancurt's detention, filed on Friday, a Multnomah County deputy district attorney wrote that Funez was suspected to be the leader of a local drug trafficking organization under the name Arteaga-Sanchez, and that he operated out of a house in Northeast Portland.
When law enforcement arrived at the front door of the house on Thursday morning, Funez attempted to escape through the back door, but then ran back inside the house and was arrested, according to the affidavit. Investigators found the 52 pounds of fentanyl in a box lined with a trash bag; when asked about it, Funez initially said it was sugar for baking cookies, but then later admitted it contained drugs.
The affidavit states that Funez and Torset were arrested on outstanding warrants — court records show Funez was charged with multiple prior drug-related offenses in January and a warrant for his arrest was issued after he failed to appear at a hearing in March. The affidavit states that prosecutors intended to bring new charges after Thursday's arrest, but Funez was released before they could be filed.
Multnomah County jail records show Funez was booked at 10:30 a.m. Thursday and released later that same day. His court record includes a pretrial release assessment filed Thursday afternoon and a release agreement that states he must appear in person for a court hearing the following morning. A subsequent document filed Friday states that he failed to appear at that hearing.
Hernandez-Betancurt and Torset are currently still in Multnomah County jail, according to the roster.
