Jackson County’s incoming district attorney says he’s planning conversations with county circuit court judges to prevent another instance of suspects in a major drug bust getting a permit to travel to their homes in another country.

Addressing the early release last week of two suspects caught south of Ashland with more than 60 pounds of fentanyl pills, however, will require structural changes to a bail reform law that has been in effect since 2022, according to Chief Deputy District Attorney Patrick Green.

Green, the elected successor to outgoing DA Beth Heckert, said the DA’s office was not contacted before suspects Daniel Pena-Gragoso, 42, and Josue Itzel Gomez-Parra, 28, were issued an out-of-the-country travel permit last week allowing them to return home to their native Mexico.

Charges filed Thursday in U.S. District Court in Medford added hyphens to the two suspects’ last names. An earlier news report drew from Jackson County Jail and circuit court records, neither of which used hyphens. 

The men caught with roughly 276,000 illicit pills during an Aug. 12 traffic stop about 10 miles north of the California border were released on their own recognizance as soon as they were processed from the jail. A judge issued the travel permit covering both of them the following day.

Green said the DA’s office would have objected if it had been consulted — and that he will do the same with any case involving a travel permit to another country.

“There are logistical issues getting someone back from a foreign country,” Green said in an interview with the Rogue Valley Times Monday afternoon. “It’s very hard to do.” 

Green said the process involves working with the federal government and the other country’s, and is typically “reserved for murder cases, honestly.” 

“It’s not something we can do with every single case,” Green said. “I will push our court going forward to get our position before granting a travel permit under these circumstances.” 

Despite the large quantity of drugs involved, and the fact that the crime for which they were arrested was a Class B felony, the crime of unlawfully delivering a Schedule II controlled substance is not one that triggers an automatic hold until suspects can make their first court appearance.

Pena-Gragoso and Gomez-Parra’s release permit followed all guidelines set in the latest presiding judge’s order that gives local judges pretrial release guidelines and instructions, according to Green and a copy of the latest order provided by Green that was independently reviewed by the Times. 

The order that Jackson County Circuit Court Presiding Judge Benjamin Bloom issued June 25 drew guidance from state law dating back to 2022, and the implementation of a bail reform bill, Senate Bill 48.

The only Class B felony controlled substance crimes that trigger an automatic hold include manufacturing or delivering hydrocodone within 1,000 feet of a school; delivering a Schedule III controlled substance such as ketamine or anabolic steroids to a minor; causing another person to ingest a controlled substance; and distributing solvents or equipment intended to manufacture a controlled substance.

Green called it “frustrating” that what he described as the most dangerous substance the state is currently facing, fentanyl, was not listed in state law.

“They made it a releasable offense under Senate Bill 48,” Green said. “It’s just nuts — that shouldn’t be happening.”

The guidelines list some overriding circumstances, such as direct threats of violence or an arrest for giving false information, but none applied to Pena-Gragoso and Gomez-Parra. The two men had no prior criminal history in Jackson County, records show.

Green said he plans to bring up the loopholes he sees to the Oregon District Attorneys Association, which represents the state’s 36 district attorneys. 

“We can lobby the Legislature through that process to make them aware of the gap,” Green said. “These cases happen all the time up and down I-5.”

In a separate update in the case, Pena-Gragoso and Gomez-Parra will be prosecuted federally for their alleged role in trafficking the more than 60 pounds of counterfeit Oxycodone pills from Arizona to Oregon, according to a new criminal complaint and affidavit filed late last week in U.S. District Court in Medford.

The affidavit filed by an Oregon State Police trooper working as a Drug Enforcement Administration task force officer updated the estimate in the amount of drugs involved in the Aug. 12 stop to 30 kilos — roughly 65 pounds — of counterfeit oxycodone pills believed to have been made with the highly concentrated synthetic opioid fentanyl.

On Aug. 15, a federal criminal complaint was filed against Pena-Gragoso and Gomez-Parra in U.S. District Court. Green said the pending federal charges “played no role” in why the DA’s office was not contacted about the travel permit because circuit court would not yet have had that information. 

Pena-Gragoso was driving a gray Volvo semi truck without a trailer and Gomez-Parra was riding passenger when OSP stopped the vehicle for traffic violations that included failure to maintain a lane, failure to signal lane changes and careless driving.

Two 5-gallon buckets filled with pills were ultimately found hidden underneath the bed in the semi. Inside the buckets were 25 bags of pills in Ziplock bags each weighing between 2.4 and 2.5 pounds.

Neither Pena-Gragoso nor Gomez-Parra had commercial drivers licenses, which are required for driving a semitrailer. 

The lack of a CDL was one of many indicators the affidavit describes as “consistent with drug trafficking, particularly with CMVs (commercial motor vehicles).” A CDL is among the first things a legitimate trucking company checks before hiring a driver.

The labeling on the side of the truck indicated the trucking company changed its names frequently and caused the paint to fade, the OSP affidavit stated, “which is common in CMV trafficking cases in order to thwart long-term investigations.”

The lack of a trailer was another flag.

“Driving a CMV with current diesel rates and associated maintenance costs is highly expensive, and most trucking companies ensure that their drivers are always pulling a load to maximize profit especially on a multi-state and multi-day trip from Phoenix, Arizona, to Portland, Oregon, which is approximately 2,600 miles there and back,” the affidavit said.

The suspects allegedly told investigators that they intended to pick up a trailer at their destination, but police observed that a phone GPS in the commercial vehicle was set to a city park in downtown Portland.

“This isn’t a place that a CMV would be able to pick up a trailer from,” the affidavit states.

No court dates had been set in the federal case as of Wednesday afternoon, records show.