WASHINGTON — Alarmed by a deadly new twist in the nation's drug addiction crisis, the government will allow states to use federal money earmarked for the opioid epidemic to help growing numbers of people struggling with meth and cocaine. The little-noticed change is buried in a massive spending bill passed...
WATCH: Coast Guard Makes Dramatic Drug Seizure, Raiding Submarine
CORONADO — U.S. Coast Guard members boarded a semi-submarine racing through the waves, one of 14 operations seizing cocaine and marijuana since May in international waters off Mexico and Central and South America. The agency released dramatic video of the encounter with smugglers on Thursday. It shows a Coast Guard...
Feds Charge Wasco State Prison Guard in Drug Conspiracy
A Wasco State Prison guard and a Minnesota man have been charged with trying to buy 40 pounds of methamphetamine and more than 4 pounds of cocaine. Federal prosecutors on Tuesday charged Joseph Andrade of Bakersfield and Leonard Velazquez-Martinez of Minnesota with conspiracy to possess drugs with intent to distribute...
Cocaine Deaths up in US, and Opioids Are a Big Part of It
NEW YORK — Cocaine deaths have been rising in the U.S., health officials said Thursday in their latest report on the nation's deadliest drug overdose epidemic. After several years of decline, overdose deaths involving cocaine began rising around 2012. And they jumped by more than a third between 2016 and...
Indictment: Ex-‘American Idol’ Contestant Was Drug Courier
NORFOLK, Va. — A recently unsealed court document says a former contestant on both "American Idol" and "Fear Factor" worked as a courier for a drug ring and was trying to deliver nearly 2 pounds (830 grams) of fentanyl when she was arrested last year. The Virginian-Pilot reports 32-year-old Antonella Barba was...
The Biggest Pinocchios of 2018: Trump, Harris, Sanders
It's time for our annual roundup of the biggest Pinocchios of the year. Once again, we face the challenge posed by President Donald Trump, who could easily dominate this list if we're not careful. There has been no serial exaggerator in recent American politics like the president. He not only...
Colombian Cartel Orders Hit on Drug-Sniffing Super Dog
BOGOTA, Colombia — This is the story of a drug dog with a bounty on its head. Sombra, a six-year-old German shepherd, has helped Colombia's police detect more than 2,000 kilos of cocaine hidden in suitcases, boats and large shipments of fruit. But as the dog sniffs her way toward...