A man caught in Oregon with a massive amount of methamphetamine and fentanyl was sentenced Thursday to 11 years and four months in federal prison.
Carlos Manuel Perez-Lopez, 43, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to distribute methamphetamine after his arrest in September 2024, when DEA agents found him with 45 pounds of methamphetamine and nearly two pounds of fentanyl pills.
Drug Enforcement Administration agents began investigating Perez-Lopez in September 2024, when an informant made two controlled drug buys from him, according to Assistant U.S. Attorney Paul T. Maloney. Agents then placed a tracking device on his Toyota Camry, he said.
On Sept. 13, 2024, after learning from an informant that Perez-Lopez was expecting a large drug delivery, agents followed his car southbound on Interstate 5.
Perez-Lopez stopped at a truck stop in Aurora, where agents watched him interact with two men beside a semi-trailer truck. When he got back into his car and drove off, agents followed him onto northbound I-5 and pulled him over near Tigard.
A narcotics-sniffing police dog detected drugs in the vehicle, the prosecutor said. Inside the Camry, police seized the 45 pounds of methamphetamine and nearly two pounds of fentanyl pills.
Separately, narcotics agents followed the semi-trailer truck when it left the rest area. The truck had three license plates - from Texas, Maine and Mexico.
The truck pulled into another rest area near Wilsonville. When the DEA agents approached, they found that the truck was running but the cab had no one in it. The agents found the driver and a passenger hiding in brush less than a mile away.
After obtaining a warrant to search the truck, federal agents removed two suitcases from the cab. Inside, they found 210 pounds of methamphetamine and arrested the two men who had fled from the truck, Maloney said.
Erick Martinez Solorio, 31, one of the men in the semi-trailer truck, was sentenced last year to two years and nine months in prison for possessing with intent to distribute methamphetamine. The other man in the truck, Enrique Salcedo Duron, has pleaded not guilty and is awaiting trial set for Oct. 13.
As for Perez-Lopez, the federal prosecutor in Portland Thursday sought a 14-year sentence for him, while Perez-Lopez’s defense attorney Jamie S. Kilberg urged an eight-year sentence.
During the sentencing hearing and in court papers, Kilberg called the government’s proposed 14-year sentence “preposterous.” He argued that Perez-Lopez was a mid-level distributor who was a “few rungs down the ladder” from the target of the federal investigation. While the weight of the drugs seized does drive federal sentencing guidelines, it doesn’t reflect Perez-Lopez’s culpability, Kilberg argued.
Kilberg also noted that his client was sent to the truck stop in Aurora but never touched the drugs. “He was told where to go and to allow the men at the truck stop to load up his vehicle,” Kilberg said. He argued that his client also should not be held responsible for the significant load of drugs seized from the semi-trailer truck.
Maloney, the assistant U.S. attorney for the case, countered that the defendant’s car was the “lynchpin” in the case.
“Within Oregon, he was a high-level dealer and a drug supplier,” he said.
Perez-Lopez apologized in court but told the judge that the government’s proposed prison term was “too long.” He said he did not think he should face a longer sentence than he otherwise would have received because he “didn’t want to cooperate” with investigators.
U.S. District Judge Karin J. Immergut responded, “‘Yes, when a defendant doesn’t cooperate, they don’t get the same deal. That’s just how it goes.”
“The business of trafficking in narcotics is a business that kills people, ruins our communities,” she added when she handed down her sentence. “You were a supplier of vast amounts of drugs.”
©2026 Advance Local Media LLC. Visit oregonlive.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.
