There was a time when Gilroy was known as a command and control center for the cartels, but the fentanyl crisis changed all that. Damian Trujillo reports.
There was a time when Gilroy was known as a command and control center for the cartels, but the fentanyl crisis changed all that.
All of Santa Clara County is now known as a high drug trafficking area.
"The pain and the despair that I live with every single day, and family lives with every single day, it just never gets easier," said Gilroy resident Geralyn Vasquez, who lost her son after he took a fentanyl pill.
The person who gave Vasquez's son the pill has not been caught, but she is comforted by the capture of Sinaloa Cartel leader Ismael Zambada in Texas.
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The Department of Justice said Zambada and his cartel are responsible for trafficking a tremendous amount of the fentanyl that end up on United States streets.
"I'm relieved, and I hope it sends a message," Vasquez said. "And we start getting tougher and crack down on these dealers."
Bob Cooke, the first vice president of the California Narcotic Officers Association, has been fighting drug dealers for decades. And while he applauds the arrest of Zambada, Cooke said the reality is it will soon be business as usual again for the cartel.
"Next man up," Cooke said. "It's like other corporate ladders and like the president of any organization or any country."
Cooke said fentanyl was a game changer in the drug trade.
There is also a new form of the drug called carfentanyl, a drug that even renders Narcan useless.
"It frightens me," Cooke said. "I've been working drugs since I was a young cop in the 70s and I've never seen anything like this."
For Vasquez, Zambada's arrest is a small victory, but there is a much bigger fight still raging.
The mother said she only hopes other parents teach their children about a drug that took a big part of her life.
