Cartel members don’t live in Kansas, but still make a direct impact, DEA says

WICHITA, Kan. (KWCH) – New DEA data shows that Mexican drug cartels make an impact on Kansas. But the report doesn’t make clear whether actual cartel members operate in Kansas.

The leader of the DEA’s Wichita office said while cartel members sometimes live in the United States, it’s unlikely they conduct actual cartel business in the U.S. themselves.

“There are cartel members in the United States, yes, but they also have associates that will do the transports that will actually transport and move these drugs,” Resident Agent in Charge Cole Helms said.

Helms said the DEA hasn’t seen any fully-fledged cartel members in Kansas, at least in recent years.

“Any connection with an actual direct member tied into Sinaloa and Jalisco cartels, it’s been associates and so forth that we actually tied them into it that way,” Helms said.

Still, the drugs the cartels bring into the U.S. make a huge impact, whether the cartels are physically operating here or not. Helms says pill presses used by the cartels can produce up to 150,000 pills a day.

And it’s not just pills. The Sedgwick County Sheriff’s Office said the county is now seeing more fentanyl in powder form.

“It used to be just strictly pills, and that means that we have folks here that are mixing up their own batches of pills or other things that they’re gonna cut fentanyl with,” Sedgwick County Sheriff Jeff Easter said.

Helms said it’s almost like “playing Russian roulette.”

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