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National Drug Intelligence Center |
Illicit drug production in Lake County is limited to crack conversion, indoor cannabis grow operations and, to a much lesser extent, methamphetamine production. Drug traffickers typically transport powder cocaine in large quantities to Lake County in order to avoid stronger federal criminal penalties associated with crack cocaine trafficking. Once in Lake County, street gang members convert powder cocaine into crack, usually near distribution sites in metropolitan areas. Law enforcement officials report that small indoor cannabis grow operations, typically maintained for personal use, are occasionally seized in the Lake County HIDTA region; however, two large indoor cannabis grows were seized in Lake County in 2008. Methamphetamine production in the Lake County HIDTA region is very limited and typically takes place in rural areas in the southern half of the county. According to National Seizure System (NSS) data, six methamphetamine laboratories were seized in Lake County during the past 5 years; no laboratories were seized in 2008.
Lake County's highly developed highway infrastructure and proximity to Chicago, a national-level distribution center for cocaine, heroin, and marijuana, make it an ideal transportation and transshipment center for illicit drugs. Millions of tons of commercial truck freight and more than one million commercial and passenger vehicles transit the HIDTA region each week. Highly organized Mexican DTOs use independent commercial trucks and private vehicles to transport multihundred-kilogram quantities of cocaine and marijuana and multikilogram quantities of heroin and methamphetamine, often concealed in hidden compartments and commingled in shipments of legitimate goods, from locations along the Southwest Border and from Chicago into and through Lake County. Mexican DTOs increasingly transport polydrug shipments of cocaine, marijuana, and heroin into the Lake County HIDTA region for distribution to markets throughout the eastern United States. Although some quantities of illicit drugs are offloaded in Lake County for local distribution, most are destined for other drug markets. For example, 25 pounds of ice methamphetamine destined for Chicago from Indianapolis, Indiana, were seized by the Lake County Drug Task Force on Interstate 65 in Lake County in March 2008. The ice methamphetamine was concealed inside a hidden compartment of a private vehicle driven by a Mexican male who was accompanied by his wife and three children.
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