Source: United States Bureau of Alcohol Tobacco Firearms and Explosives (ATF)
ST. PAUL, Minn. – Following a three-day trial, a federal jury found defendant Carl Maurice Brown, 32, guilty of conspiracy to distribute fentanyl and methamphetamine, announced Acting U.S. Attorney Joseph H. Thompson.
In February 2024, a federal grand jury indicted multiple defendants, including scheme leader Ezell Cordero Lucas, a/k/a “Cash,” and trial defendant Carl Brown, with engaging in a Conspiracy to Distribute Fentanyl and Methamphetamine. Carl Brown proceeded to trial and today a federal jury found him guilty. Six other defendants, including scheme leader Lucas, have pled guilty and are awaiting sentencing.
“This conviction closes the book on a dangerous fentanyl trafficking ring that pumped poison into northern Minnesota from Chicago,” said Acting U.S. Attorney Joseph H. Thompson. “Fentanyl has devastated families and communities across our state, and this case is a powerful reminder: we will not let drug traffickers exploit our cities or our rural communities. We are grateful to the federal, state, and local partners whose tireless work dismantled this network and helped protect Minnesotans from the lethal fentanyl epidemic.”
From December 2021 to February 2024, defendant Ezell Lucas, a/k/a “Cash,” managed a large-scale drug distribution operation (the “Lucas drug trafficking organization” or the “Lucas DTO”) based in Chicago, Illinois, that transported mass quantities of fentanyl to Duluth, Minnesota, for sale to drug customers in the Twin Ports region. Lucas worked with local drug distributors in Duluth to traffic fentanyl from Chicago and establish a customer base in Duluth. Lucas directed criminal associates from Chicago, including defendant Carl Brown, to travel to Duluth and conduct the organization’s operations on the ground. Lucas, sitting in Chicago, fielded calls from drug customers and directed those customers to pre-determined locations in Duluth to meet Lucas’s drug dealers and complete the sales. During a two-year period, law enforcement seized more than 890 grams of fentanyl and 262 grams of methamphetamine from the Lucas DTO over the course of 19 seizure events, including controlled buys, traffic stops, residence search warrants, and a seizure incident to an overdose death.
Brown will be sentenced at a later date. He faces up to life in prison.
This case is the result of an investigation conducted by the Duluth Police Department, the Saint Louis County Sheriff’s Office, the Lake Superior Violent Offender Task Force, and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF).
Assistant U.S. Attorneys Garrett S. Fields and Syngen Kanassatega are prosecuting the case.