Dominican National Sentenced for Trafficking Heroin and Fentanyl

BOSTON – A Dominican national was sentenced today in federal court in Boston for supplying heroin and fentanyl to traffickers in Taunton and surrounding communities.

Jonathan Ruiz, 33, a Dominican national residing in Lawrence, was sentenced by U.S. District Court Judge George A. O’Toole Jr. to six years in prison and three years of supervised release.  Ruiz will be subject to deportation upon completion of his sentence. In June 2017, Ruiz pleaded guilty to conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute and to distribute heroin and fentanyl.

In April 2016, Ruiz was arrested and charged in a superseding indictment along with 25 others who had been charged the previous October in connection with a heroin trafficking ring operating primarily in southeastern Massachusetts.  Ruiz trafficked in narcotics from Lawrence, supplying distributers in Taunton, Fall River and other locations. The charges are the result of a 15-month investigation into heroin and fentanyl trafficking in Taunton and surrounding communities.

Ruiz and co-defendants, Dedwin Cruz-Rivera, a heroin supplier based in Taunton, Manuel Romero-Gonsalez, a heroin supplier based in Providence, R.I., and Eric Matos, a heroin and fentanyl supplier based in Lawrence, supplied co-conspirators, Oniel Rivera, Cory Nickerson, and Maria Elena Ocasio, among others, with heroin and occasionally fentanyl for distribution. Ruiz also supplied fentanyl and heroin to Cruz-Rivera.

Matos, Ocasio, Nickerson, Rivera, and Romero-Gonsalez all pleaded guilty and have been sentenced. Cruz-Rivera pleaded guilty and is scheduled to be sentenced Nov. 28, 2017.

Acting United States Attorney William D. Weinreb and Michael J. Ferguson, Special Agent in Charge of the Drug Enforcement Administration, New England Field Division, made the announcement.  Assistant U.S. Attorneys Thomas E. Kanwit, Karen Beausey, Katherine Ferguson and Ann Taylor of Weinreb’s Narcotics and Money Laundering Unit are prosecuting the cases.