NEW YORK: A modest South Buffalo home became the center of one of the nation’s biggest drug busts.
U.S. Attorney William J. Hochul said fentanyl, cocaine and heroin taken from the Folger Street home in March was part of the 140 pounds of drugs seized from five alleged high-level drug dealers in Western New York and California over the past several months.
The drugs, with a street value of $3.5 million, represent “perhaps the largest seizure of combined narcotics in the nation’s history,” Hochul said Wednesday.
Most of the drugs were found in the home at 98 Folger St., where Buffalo police seized 53 pounds of cocaine and 17 pounds of fentanyl during a response to a 911 call about a family dispute.
The fentanyl taken from the home was one of the five largest seizures of the drug in the country, said John Flickinger, head of the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration office in Buffalo.
Neighbors on Folger Street, who asked not to be named, said it is a traditionally quiet area and that they were glad to be rid of drug peddlers.
The fentanyl seizure amounted to 200 million to 300 million “hits” of the lethal drug taken off the streets, Hochul said.
Hochul announced the indictment of five people on federal charges of conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute heroin, fentanyl and cocaine: Herman E. Aguirre, 41, of Brea, Calif.; Troy R. Gillon, 41, of Lockport; Darryl J. Williams, 43, of Williamsville; Maulana Lucas, 41, of Niagara Falls; and Shirley Grigsby, 40, of Buffalo.
Police said they discovered about $2 million in drugs stuffed in duffel bags in Shirley Grigsby’s bedroom on Folger Street.
