Ricardo Payan-Beltran, 39, a Mexican national, was sentenced today in federal court in Boise to 30 months in prison for conspiracy to distribute methamphetamine and marijuana, U.S. Attorney Wendy J. Olson announced. U.S. District Judge Edward J. Lodge also ordered Payan- Beltran to serve 5 years of supervised release following his prison term.

At his plea hearing on March 1, 2011, Payan-Beltran admitted that he joined a drug trafficking conspiracy sometime after February 2009. Thereafter, he bought methamphetamine from co-conspirators, which he subsequently sold. The conspiracy ended in June 2010 when investigators arrested Payan-Beltran and other conspiracy members.

The investigation was the result of a joint investigation of the Organized Crime and Drug Enforcement Task Force (OCDETF), led by the Drug Enforcement Administration, in conjunction with the Nampa Police Department.

The OCDETF program is a federal multi-agency, multi-jurisdictional task force that supplies supplemental federal funding to federal and state agencies involved in the identification, investigation, and prosecution of major drug trafficking organizations.