Mexican drug cartels have expanded all the way north and are targeting America’s “last best place” by attacking vulnerable Native American communities in Montana.
A recent report shows that Montana is the second most “addicted” state, with 18.2 percent of the state’s population using illicit drugs in 2021 – a figure that only rising over time.
Drug cartels from Mexico are drawn to the state of Montana because of the amount of money they can squeeze out of its residents.
For example, fentanyl pills in Montana can be sold for 20 times the price than in other areas, such as urban centers closer to the border. The pills can be made for less than 25 cents in Mexico and sold for $3 to $5 in urban cities, but can fetch up to $100 in parts of Montana.
The drug problem has particularly plagued Montana’s Indian reservations, where human traffickers trap Native Americans in a cycle of addiction and debt.
Mexican drug cartels have expanded all the way north and are targeting America’s ‘last best place’ by attacking vulnerable Native American communities in Montana
A recent report found Montana to be the second most “addicted” state, with 18.2 percent of the state’s population using illicit drugs in 2021 – a figure that has only increased over time.
Cartels have aggressively invaded the notoriously beautiful state, even establishing relationships with indigenous women to gain access to communities and addict locals to drugs.
Tribal leaders say crimes and overdoses are on the rise in their communities, and the cartels “know who to pick,” said Stephanie Iron Shooter, the American Indian health director for the Montana Department of Health and Human Services.
“Just like any other prey-predator situation, that’s how it is.”
Indian reservations are optimal targets for drug organizations because they have high drug addiction rates and few law enforcement officers.
Montana’s opioid overdose death rate nearly tripled between 2017 and 2020, and overdose deaths among Native Americans were twice the number of white residents, according to the state. Department of Health and Human Services.
Traffickers have manipulated Native Americans into becoming dealers themselves by giving them an initial supply of drugs to sell, then turning them into addicts and putting them in debt to the cartels, NBC reported.
In March 2020, a former Mexican police officer working for the Sinaloa Cartel attempted to smuggle enough meth to supply the entire town of Townsend, Montana, with meth for several days.
The mule, Ricardo Ramos Medina, reached the US and picked up a grocery bag containing two pounds of pure methamphetamine, which he planned to ride all the way from San Diego to Montana.
Medina was stopped by state and federal agents and arrested — leading to the takedown of an entire drug smuggling ring that had brought at least 2,000 pounds of meth and 700,000 fentanyl-laced pills from Mexico to Montana in just three years.
Drug cartels from Mexico are drawn to the state of Montana because of the amount of money they can squeeze out of its residents
For example, fentanyl pills can be sold for 20 times the price in Montana than in other areas, such as urban centers closer to the border
The drug problem has particularly plagued Montana’s Indian reservations, where human traffickers trap Native Americans in a cycle of addiction and debt.
The rise of fentanyl in the US has hit Montana in a big way, with the state seizing 350,000 dosage units of fentanyl, compared to half that number in 2022.
“Right now, it’s like fentanyl is raining on our reservation,” said Marvin Weatherwax, Jr., member of the Blackfeet Tribal Business Council and representative of the 15th District in the Montana House of Representatives.
Jesse Laslovich, Montana’s U.S. attorney, who is overseeing the investigations, said people are surprised that the drug epidemic emerging from Mexican cartels has spread all the way to Montana.
“You’re as far north as you can get in the United States, and yet we have the cartel here,” she said.
Despite often being referred to as “the last best place” in America, Montana has been neglected by the pharmaceutical industry.
Near the state’s Cheyenne Reservation, abandoned houses once used as trap houses fill the once beautiful rural landscape, and gas stations in and out of the community are the sites of drug deals.
Cartels linked to Medina’s drug trade took over at least two properties on the reservation to distribute meth to nearby communities.
Ranita R. Redfield and Zachary D. Bacon were brought into the cartel as community members.
Refield’s lawyer described how her vulnerable client was targeted after a period of family turmoil and heartbreak.
“She chose to distance herself from acquaintances who knew her from the past and had no place to live, often remaining with the cartel,” attorney Jessica Polan Wright wrote.
The rise of fentanyl in the US has had a major impact on Montana, with the state seizing 350,000 dosage units of fentanyl, compared to half that number in 2022.
Tribal leaders say crimes and overdoses are on the rise in their communities, and the cartels ‘know who to pick’ (Photo: 19 firearms seized by federal agents in Montana drug bust)
“Caught in the vicious cycle of addiction and under the cartel’s control, Ranita became a pawn in their operations.”
She was sentenced to five years in prison after pleading guilty to dealing meth.
Bacon was brought in after he started dating the daughter of one of the Native American drug dealers.
“The cartel took tens of thousands of dollars in cash, weapons and vehicles from the Crow reservation,” said Bacon’s attorney Matthew Claus.
“Money and weapons flowed out of the state and out of the country, after which the cartel left. In their wake, they left behind addicted, impoverished, impoverished tribal members who were persecuted and given long prison sentences, like Zach Bacon,” Claus added.
On another reservation in Montana, the Blackfeet Reservation, seventeen people overdosed on fentanyl in just one week.
“We lack many resources to deal with a crisis that even our facility is not equipped to handle,” said Durand Tyland Bear Medicine, director of the Crystal Creek Lodge Treatment Center.
Reservations in southeastern Montana are also being rocked by the widespread drug epidemic, but they are particularly affected by methamphetamine use.