Javier Eduardo Gutierrez-Quintana, a 47-year-old commercial trucker from El Paso, Texas, entered a guilty plea to a charge of possession with intent to distribute 20 kilograms of cocaine following an encounter with the Ohio State Highway Patrol (OSHP) officers, as detailed in court documents, the source of this revelation is a press release from the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Northern District of Ohio.
During the routine traffic stop on May 31, the OSHP conducted an inspection of Gutierrez-Quintana's vehicle, which sported a Texas license plate and registration, and their drug-sniffing canine signaled the presence of narcotics, prompting the defendant to permit a search where officers uncovered three black duffle bags filled with suspicious blue-taped packages, this incident led to the confession from Gutierrez-Quintana who admitted the substance was indeed cocaine intended to be delivered in the Youngstown, Ohio area to an as-of-yet unidentified contact.
Following the discovery, laboratory analysis affirmed that the packages contained cocaine. Gutierrez-Quintana is now awaiting his sentencing which is set for November 22 he faces a maximum of 20 years in prison for the narcotics possession with intent to distribute charge, in addition to likely supervised release, restitution, and monetary penalties, a fact supported by the pending judicial process where a federal district court judge will ultimately determine the sentence based on the U.S. Sentencing Guidelines among other statutory considerations.
