KANSAS CITY, Mo. — A 27-year-old Mexican national who was deported and illegally re-entered the United States within days was sentenced to 9½ years in federal prison for possessing more than 56 pounds of methamphetamine, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Western District of Missouri announced.
U.S. District Judge Roseann A. Ketchmark sentenced Pablo DeJesus Peralta Anguis on charges of possessing methamphetamine with the intent to distribute and unlawful reentry after removal. The sentence carries no parole. ICE officers confirmed Anguis had been found illegally in the United States by Border Patrol agents near Nogales, Ariz., on Aug. 22, 2024, and was removed to Mexico that same day — less than two weeks before the traffic stop that led to his arrest.
A Missouri State Highway Patrol trooper pulled over a vehicle on Interstate 29 in Kansas City on Sept. 3, 2024. The driver, Pedro Alberto Quiroz Ayala, 22, did not have a valid driver’s license. Apolinar Gocovachi Pacheco, 26, and Anguis were in the back seat, with a female juvenile in the front passenger seat. A search of the vehicle turned up approximately 55.6 pounds of methamphetamine in a large duffle bag in the third-row seating area, approximately one pound of methamphetamine in a grocery bag on the floorboard, and a loaded firearm in the driver’s door pouch.
When the four occupants exited the vehicle, Ayala and Anguis fled on foot. Both were apprehended after a manhunt. Ayala told investigators the group had driven to Omaha, Neb., to pick up drugs, and that he received approximately $2,000 for his help transporting them. Pacheco told investigators he had arrived in the United States approximately two weeks earlier from Nogales Sonora, Mexico, paying $6,000 to cross the border illegally. Pacheco said Anguis asked him to travel from Kansas City, Kan., to Omaha to pick up the drugs and promised him a significant amount of U.S. currency for assisting.
All three men have now been sentenced. Ayala pleaded guilty to possessing methamphetamine with the intent to distribute and received 11 years in prison without parole on May 6, 2026. Pacheco pleaded guilty to the same charge plus unlawful reentry after removal and was sentenced to eight years without parole on April 2, 2026.
The case was prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Brad K. Kavanaugh as part of the Department of Justice’s Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Forces Co-located Strike Forces Initiative. Investigating agencies included the FBI, the Drug Enforcement Administration, the Jackson County Drug Task Force, the Kansas City Police Department, and the Missouri State Highway Patrol.