Alleged cocaine dealer unknowingly arranged sale with undercover officer, witnesses testify
Days before police arrested two Carpentersville men in connection with a large-scale cocaine operation, the pair met with an undercover officer who was posing as an interested buyer, officials said.
Testimony continued Tuesday in the trial of Juan F. Sanchez-Cacho, who is accused of possessing 30 pounds of cocaine during a September 2018 drug investigation. Sanchez-Cacho, 44, is charged with possession with intent to deliver cocaine and possession of a controlled substance.
On Tuesday, Chicago police Sgt. John Hamilton testified about the days of police surveillance that officers conducted on an Arrow Street home that Sanchez-Cacho shared with another man, Ivan Moreno-Gollegos.
Moreno-Gollegos also was charged in connection with the drug investigation. He accepted a plea deal in March and was sentenced to 16 years in prison for possession with intent to deliver cocaine.
Investigators began watching Moreno-Gollegos and Sanchez-Cacho after a Sept. 17, 2018, meeting between the men and an undercover Chicago police officer. The three men met inside an Elgin Mexican restaurant where additional officers were outside.
"We discussed pricing of kilos and how many I wanted and how much he could provide," the undercover officer testified in court Tuesday.
One of the men offered to sell 30 kilograms of cocaine at $30,000 per kilogram, the officer said.
After the meeting, police followed Sanchez-Cacho and Moreno-Gollegos to their home and watched the pair for several days, multiple police witnesses testified.
None of the Chicago, Lake in the Hills or Kane County sheriff's deputies who testified filed a report based on the Elgin meeting.
On Sept. 20, 2018, Hamilton said he followed the men to a Lake in the Hills warehouse where the pair received a shipment of unknown goods from a semitruck. Moreno-Gollegos later placed a speaker box and a cooler in the trunk of his car and drove away. Officers who conducted a traffic stop on the vehicle discovered 16 bricks of cocaine hidden within the items in the trunk, witnesses testified.
Officers arrested Sanchez-Cacho as he tried to leave the warehouse.
The trial continues Wednesday in McHenry County court.