Heroin Ring Is Broken Up on Upper East Side

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The New York Sun

Authorities have broken up a heroin packaging operation based out of an Upper East Side studio, arresting seven suspects, including a Manhattan court officer, officials said today.

The raid was part of a three-day crackdown on a drug operation that authorities said was netting $4 million a year. Following a lengthy investigation, a task force of federal and city law enforcement on Wednesday raided the second floor studio at 242 East 75th St., which overlooks a playground at Robert F. Wagner Middle School, officials said.

At the time, the kingpin of the operation, Juan Pablo Ramos, was packaging heroin into glassine envelopes, officials said.

Law enforcement confiscated about 1 kilogram of cocaine, valued at about $100,000, numerous glassine bags used for packaging, and other drug paraphernalia inside the apartment, which Mr. Ramos had nicknamed “the office,” officials said.

On the same day, authorities searched Mr. Ramos’s personal residence, a $5,600-a-month apartment in Edgewater, New Jersey. Officials confiscated bank records and computers, as well as a 2008 Acura, a 2005 Audi, and a 2001 BMW, officials said.

Late yesterday, the task force arrested four other suspects believed to be salespeople for the operation, officials said. Officials said they believe the suspects, Irene Andriani, Olga Gioe, Luis Gautier, and Michael Joseph Rivello, purchased bundles of glassine bags of heroin from Mr. Ramos that were resold.

A Manhattan court officer, William Moser, was arrested last night at a supermarket on Bleecker Street in Manhattan along with Ms. Andriani, officials said. At the time of his arrest, Mr. Moser, who authorities believe to be a customer of Ms. Andriani, had three glassines of heroin worth about $30 and his court-issued firearm in his possession, officials said.

Mr. Ramos was arraigned yesterday in Manhattan Criminal Court on charges of on criminal possession of a controlled substance in the first degree, officials said. He is being held on $300,000 bail.


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