Lynn drug suspect held on $500G

LYNN – A Lynn man was arraigned Friday in Lynn District Court on charges of narcotics trafficking, distributing cocaine and heroin and using a false identity to obtain a Massachusetts driver’s license.Carlos Pena Diaz, of 93 Lynnway, Lynn, who has been using the name and social security number of Eduardo Garcia Rios, was arrested after a 10-month joint investigation by the Lynn Drug Task Force and the Boston unit of the Drug Enforcement Agency. Judge Domenic Paratore set Diaz’s bail at $500,000.Over the course of a lengthy investigation, law enforcement officials gathered information about Diaz through other suspects who were arrested for selling heroin, including one man who was picked up in connection with a fatal overdose. Two of the suspects questioned by state police and Lynn detectives admitted to being street-level narcotics dealers and said that Diaz, who also goes by the name Carlito, was a supplier.In March, 2010, Lynn detectives and DEA agents observed Diaz park his maroon Nissan Murano on Nahant Street in Lynn. A woman entered the vehicle through the passenger side, exited a few seconds later and drove away in another vehicle. Police followed the woman and stopped and questioned her on the Lynnway. She admitted she had bought two bags of heroin and one bag of cocaine from Diaz.Two days later, police arranged for a cooperating witness to purchase $80 of heroin from Diaz in a supermarket parking lot in Lynn.Police arrested Diaz on Thursday and charged him with selling heroin during those two incidents in March. He was also charged with filing a fraudulent license application.While he was in police custody, Lynn police and DEA agents searched the home Diaz shared with his girlfriend. Narcotics-trained dogs were brought in to search the apartment, the basement of the building and the backyard. Police found pieces of a heroin finger press, a device used to compress and pack the drug, but did not find any narcotics.After several hours of searching, Lynn Police Lt. Daniel Fee was in the backyard when he noticed a wooden gate that led to a walkway on the side of the building. After a closer look, Fee discovered that a patch of earth around the gate was loose. Fee dug through the soft dirt and found a plastic bag with about 15 fingers of heroin or approximately 180 grams of the drug. Roughly 15 grams of a white substance believed to be cocaine was also found in the bags.At his arraignment, Diaz was assigned a public defender to represent him. Judge Paratore also informed him that he has the right to request a review of his bail.