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- A federal grand jury indicted Moises Lozano-Valdez for drug possession with intent to distribute.
- Lozano-Valdez was transporting drugs from Los Angeles to Chicago when stopped in Utah.
- Brennan Christoper Bennett, a felon, was indicted for possessing firearms in Salt Lake City.
SALT LAKE CITY — A federal grand jury has indicted a man accused of smuggling meth and cocaine through Utah.
Moises Lozano-Valdez faces federal charges of meth possession with intent to distribute and cocaine possession with intent to distribute.
On Oct. 26, a Honda Accord was pulled over on I-80 near Echo Reservoir for having an illegal window tint, according to the Utah Highway Patrol. A trooper detected the odor of marijuana while speaking to the driver, Lozano-Valdez, and noticed what appeared to be marijuana products in the center console, a federal complaint states. Subsequently, Lozano-Valdez's vehicle was searched.
"During the search, troopers located a THC vape pen and raw marijuana within the ziplock-style plastic bag previously observed by the trooper. Troopers also located a large speaker box in the trunk that did not appear to have any speaker wires connected to it. Troopers noticed that the speaker box also had tooling marks and other signs of wear on it, suggesting that the box had been opened or tampered with. Troopers opened the speaker box and observed several large plastic packages concealed within the box," the complaint states.
An estimated 66 pounds of methamphetamine and 2 pounds of cocaine were seized.
When questioned by investigators, Lozano-Valdez said "he was transporting the drugs in his vehicle from Los Angeles to Chicago at the time he was stopped by police in Utah. Lozano-Valdez also stated that he had completed another drug trafficking-related trip a few days prior, and that he was transporting the drugs from Los Angeles to Chicago for the same group in both trips," according to court documents.
A search of Lozano-Valdez's phone revealed pictures of large amounts of cash, the complaint states.
"The combined quantity of methamphetamine and cocaine represents well over 200,000 individual user doses of those substances," according to prosecutors.
Also on Thursday, in a separate investigation, a Salt Lake man was indicted by a federal grand jury for being a felon in possession of firearms.
Brennan Christopher Bennett, 41, was convicted in 2021 of two counts of attempted enticement of a minor. Because of that conviction, he is not allowed to own guns.
But according to a complaint filed in federal court, agents from the FBI and the Child Exploitation and Human Task Force served a search warrant on Bennett's apartment on Oct. 28.
"During the execution of that search warrant, it was discovered that the subject, Brennan Christopher Bennett, had four firearms which were located in his residence and his vehicle," according to court documents. "He admitted that he had acquired the firearms opportunistically for the purpose of his protection."
Prosecutors say four rifles, including three that are listed in court documents as "assault rifles," were seized.
