On Sept. 21, Chester County District Attorney Tom Hogan announced the arrest of Jose Uriel Arreola-Ortiz, 27, for drug trafficking. He is charged with supplying a confidential informant with a kilogram of crystal methamphetamine and a half-kilogram of fentanyl-laced heroin.

Arreola-Ortiz ran a drug operation out of California and Mexico, supplying drugs in bulk to southern Chester County for resale. He was arrested on Sept. 11 when he flew to Chester County to pick up a payment for the drugs.

Arreola-Ortiz is a Mexican national who was living illegally in the United States. In March 2019, he was in Chester County to collect payment for a marijuana shipment and was introduced to a confidential informant working with the Chester County Detectives.

He set up a deal to send the informant a kilo of crystal meth for resale, and told the informant to deposit money into a bank account under a false name. Once the money was deposited, Arreola-Ortiz sent a kilo of meth on March 28, 2019.

After several communications, Arreola-Ortiz offered to sell the informant meth and heroin. He had the informant put money into another bank account under another assumed name.

On Aug. 29, 2019, the informant got a half-kilo of what turned out to be mostly fentanyl, mixed with a smaller amount of heroin. The drug could have caused dozens of overdose deaths if it had been used.

On Sept. 11, 2019, Arreola-Ortiz came to Chester County to get payment for the drugs. He was met by detectives and arrested on drug trafficking charges. He is in Chester County Prison with a bail of $1 million cash. He is slated to have a preliminary hearing in the near future.

“Crystal meth and fentanyl-laced heroin are the evil twins of current street drugs,” Hogan said. “The world is a dark place where we can order up a kilo of meth and a half-kilo of heroin/fentanyl this easily. However, as local drug dealers, and now international drug traffickers are learning, they’d better stay out of Chester County.”