LUDLOW, Mass. (WWLP) – A man from Mexico was sentenced to prison in connection with trafficking cocaine at the Ludlow service plaza on the Massachusetts Turnpike.

According to the Department of Justice, in August 2022 an investigation into a Mexican-based drug trafficking organization named 31-year-old Joel Enrique Armenta Castro of Mochis, Sinaloa, Mexico as a suspect. The FBI provided information to the Massachusetts State Police that two Mexican suppliers were heading to the state to deliver the truckload of cocaine. 

On August 29, 2022, Castro drove from Boston to the Ludlow service plaza and obtained 15 kilograms of cocaine from a tractor-trailer. Officers witnessed the transaction and he was arrested.

Castro pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to distribute and to possess with intent to distribute controlled substances and one count of distribution of and possession with intent to distribute five kilograms or more of cocaine.

He was sentenced on Thursday to four years in prison and two years of supervised release.

Local News

WWLP-22News, an NBC affiliate, began broadcasting in 1953 by providing local news, network, syndicated, and local programming to western Massachusetts. Follow 22News on X @WWLP22News, Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube.