By Duane Barbati
Alamogordo Daily News
ALAMOGORDO, NM — A former Otero County Prison Facility corrections officer pleaded guilty Wednesday in a Las Cruces federal courtroom for his involvement in a scheme to smuggle narcotics into the prison facility, according to a press release.
In a press release U.S. Attorney for the District of New Mexico spokeswoman Elizabeth M. Martinez stated Luis Delgadillo, 38, of El Paso, plead guilty to an indictment charging him with conspiracy to distribute methamphetamine and heroin into the Otero County Prison Facility in Chaparral.
Martinez wrote in the release that Delgadillo is the last of six defendants to plead guilty in the case.
Delgadillo was indicted in August on a drug trafficking conspiracy charge alone with Gary Borja, 26, Armando Lopez, 28, and Ana Lopez, 26, all of Albuquerque; Nancy Salas, 35, of Alamogordo, and Eric Lovato, 30, of Boles Acres, Martinez stated in the release.
She wrote that all six defendants participated in a conspiracy to smuggle drugs into the prison facility between December 2013 and April 2014, when Borja, Armando Lopez and Lovato were inmates at the facility, and Delgadillo was employed as a corrections officer at OCPF.
Martinez stated that according to federal court records, the FBI initiated an investigation in January after receiving information from the New Mexico Corrections Department allegedly showing Delgadillo was smuggling heroin and methamphetamine into the Otero County Prison Facility.
The investigators included a review recorded inmate telephone calls and prison facility surveillance video, physical surveillance and the results of inmate drug testing, identified the six defendants as members of a conspiracy to allegedly smuggle narcotics into OCPF between January and April, Martinez wrote in the release.
During his plea hearing in federal court, Delgadillo admitted participating in a conspiracy to smuggle drugs into the OCPF between December 2013 and April 2014, according to the press release.
Martinez stated in the release that Delgadillo admitted to smuggling an ounce of methamphetamine into the prison facility in December; an ounce of heroin in February 2014; and another ounce of heroin in April 2014.
Delgadillo also admitted that on April 26, 2014, he met with Ana Lopez and obtained 25 grams of methamphetamine, 11 grams of heroin and 10 suboxone pills from Lopez but Delgadillo was arrested before he was able to smuggle the drugs into OCPF, Martinez wrote in the release.
According to the release, each of the defendants at their sentencing hearing face a maximum prison sentence of 20 years. They will remain in federal custody pending their sentencing hearing.