NEAH BAY — A 21-year-old Neah Bay man is in federal custody after attempting to smuggle about 60,000 tablets of the illegal drug Ecstasy from Vancouver Island to the North Olympic Peninsula in a small boat last week.
The crew of a Coast Guard response boat discovered the drugs, worth about $720,000, in a duffle bag on an 18-foot boat piloted by Reed H. McCarty north of Neah Bay near the international border in the Strait of Juan de Fuca on Thursday.
McCarty is facing charges of possession of the drug with intent to distribute. He is being held at a federal detention center in Seattle/Tacoma.
Ecstasy, an illegal narcotic, is known for creating a sense of euphoria, along with damaging brain cells that produce serotonin.
“This is a pretty significant bust for the Coast Guard, not only in Neah Bay, but for the Coast Guard in general,” Coast Guard spokesman Petty Officer Eric Chandler said.
While certainly not a small amount, the tablets aren’t the largest shipment of Ecstasy caught headed for the Peninsula’s shores.
Four Canadian men were caught at a boat launch in Freshwater Bay trying to load a boat carrying nearly 700,000 Ecstasy tablets onto a trailer in October 2006.
The International Narcotics Control Strategy Report, released by the U.S. State Department in March, called Canada a “major source country for Ecstasy to U.S. markets.”
The head of Coast Guard law enforcement from Blaine to the Quillayute River said that McCarty’s arrest wasn’t planned.
Lt. Gabriel Vigil said he was stopped by a single 25-foot Coast Guard response boat because of its close proximity to the border.
“Any vessel in vicinity of the border is always going to raise interest,” he said.
Vigil said the vessel was likely searched after McCarty’s behavior or explanation of what he was doing that far out in the Strait raised suspicion.
Destination unknown
He said he was unsure whether the boat was headed to Neah Bay or some other destination along the Peninsula’s coast.
Thursday wasn’t the first time the Coast Guard had become aware of McCarty.
Neah Bay Police Chief Sam White said he had become the focus of a joint investigation between his department and the Coast Guard about two months ago.
“We had been looking at that particular individual for narcotic trafficking for quite some time,” he said.
White said McCarty is “tied up with a [drug] ring” in Canada but declined to provide further information out of concern of harming the investigation.
“We’re not done on our end,” he added.
“There’s more involved than just that.
“This thing is still ongoing.”
White called drug smuggling a “real threat” on the Peninsula all along the coast.
The last illegal drugs found smuggled into Neah Bay was probably about five or seven years ago, he said, when a few bundles of marijuana were found on the beach.
Vigil said that due to the Peninsula’s long, sparsely populated coast, drugs are likely smuggled into the United States via the Strait on a weekly basis.
Clallam County Sheriff’s Chief Criminal Deputy Ron Cameron, who is also the commander of the Olympic Peninsula Narcotics Enforcement Team, agrees that Peninsula’s isolated areas does lend itself to drug smuggling, but he added that the contraband is typically headed for larger markets.
“[The Peninsula] is a flow through area, not a target destination,” he said.
Cameron said marijuana is the most common illegal drug to find its way across the Strait.
He said 2004 was a “big year” with about 20 marijuana smuggling arrests made.
“[British Columbia] bud was quite the thing at that time,” Cameron said.
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Reporter Tom Callis can be reached at 360-417-3532 or at tom.callis@peninsuladailynews.com.
