Two B.C. residents are being held in a Washington State jail – with bail set at one million dollars each – while police inspect alleged ties to an international drug and murder investigation.
Michelle Fung, 24, and Carlos Martinez, 52, were arrested on July 15 outside the airport in Sunnyside, Wash. (approximately 275 kilometres southeast of Seattle) shortly after meeting with a person who got off a recently landed plane.
Police detained Fung and Martinez and confronted the person from the plane, and subsequently found a black duffle bag, with 10,600 grams of cocaine (valued at $287,000 USD) and 3,100 grams of methamphetamine (valued at $56,000 USD), along with 2,400 grams of suspected heroin or fentanyl.
“Based on the amounts located it was very obvious that this was a high level drug transaction, which appeared to have international ties to Canada, since both suspects were citizens of Canada as was the other subject from the airplane,” an affidavit filed by police said.
But their arrests were also connected to an ongoing investigation into the 2014 and 2015 murders of two men in Calgary.
On July 19, Calgary Police Service executed a number of search warrants, and charged two men with first-degree murder into the deaths of Jason Quinn Antonio and Taylor John Zanini.
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Gursharanjit Parmar and Joshua Lloyd Okabe, both of Calgary, have each been charged with two counts of first-degree murder and one count of conspiracy to import cocaine. Two other men were also charged with counts of conspiracy to import cocaine.
On July 20, Calgary police said their arrests were connected.
Fung and Martinez have had their passports revoked, but the wherabouts of the person who met them at the Sunnyside airport is unknown.
Their next court appearance is on Aug. 1.
– With files from the Yakima Herald