Drug kingpin David “Cholo” Mendoza-Enriquez landed in the crosshairs of the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency in 2020.
As head of a network accused of moving large quantities of fentanyl from Juarez to Albuquerque, Mendoza-Enriquez was one of the so-called big fish DEA agents sought to take down while employing a controversial tactic that has sparked outrage since it was first reported by news media in late June: letting some drug shipments to go unseized.
While authorities took down major players in New Mexico’s deadly fentanyl market, like Mendoza-Enriquez, the question remains: Was it worth allowing the release of fentanyl pills into a state grappling with decades of opioid addiction and a growing overdose death rate?
DEA Special Agent David Howell, who filed a 2023 whistleblower complaint about tactics used during the operation, says at least hundreds of thousands of fentanyl pills, and potentially millions, flowed into the streets of Albuquerque and beyond between 2023 and 2025, and he is certain the practice “got people killed.”
Tessa DuBerry, a spokesperson for the U.S. Attorney’s Office in New Mexico, defended the federal operations. “The goal of the investigations at issue was to identify and dismantle major drug trafficking organizations,” she said. “The public record shows federal prosecutions during the relevant period, including indictments, guilty pleas, sentencings and significant fentanyl seizures.”
Mendoza-Enriquez, a Mexican national, was indicted in January 2024, along with more than a dozen co-defendants, and sentenced in December to 17 years in federal prison.
Prosecutors say he led a trafficking organization that pushed “tens of thousands of pills” into New Mexico, smuggled undocumented immigrants and imported exotic animals, including a tiger cub named Duke discovered after a shooting tied to Mendoza-Enriquez’s accomplices.
The bust
Federal officials would announce a much larger bust in a five-state operation in May 2025 — a record-breaking DEA fentanyl haul of over 400 kilograms. Federal, state and local authorities arrested 16 people, including one in Santa Fe and two in Albuquerque. An alleged Sinaloa cartel leader in Oregon was one of the defendants.
Agents at the time had seized 110,000 pills from a Rufina Street stash house run by Phillip Lovato, 39, of Santa Fe, according to a criminal complaint filed April 29, 2025, in U.S. District Court.
About 365,000 fentanyl pills were discovered at the home of one Albuquerque defendant and about 165 kilograms of the drug — more than 40 percent of the total haul and likely more than a million pills — from a storage unit rented by another, the U.S. Attorney’s Office alleged at the time.
By August 2025, Lovato and six others accused in the bust had pleaded guilty, and one defendant had been convicted.
Investigations referenced in Howell’s whistleblower complaint two years earlier generated mixed results.
While some defendants are still awaiting sentencing, the punishment for others ranges from time served to five years’ probation to Mendoza-Enriquez’s 17-year prison sentence.
DuBerry, from the U.S. Attorney’s Office, provided The New Mexican with a handful of complaints and indictments against multiple alleged drug traffickers targeted by the DEA and tied to investigations cited in Howell’s complaint.
The defendants include Victor Manuel Bolivar, who is accused of selling an undercover agent close to 3,000 fentanyl pills for $2,800 in September 2023. Bolivar is scheduled to be sentenced Tuesday (July 21).
An indictment against Bolivar, along with Israel Barraza-Reyes, accuses the pair of distributing fentanyl and methamphetamine, as well as possession with intent to distribute cocaine. Barraza-Reyes received five years’ probation.
The U.S. Department of Justice’s Office of Professional Responsibility issued a report in September 2024 on Howell’s complaint, finding his allegations of wrongdoing were unsubstantiated. He filed a response days later.
“I do believe in catching the ‘bigger fish,’ just not at the expense of placing the general public in danger,” wrote Howell, who is still working for the DEA.
He also wrote in his response he believed the Office of Professional Responsibility’s report lacked credibility, noting it found the conduct he alleged did not constitute “a substantial or specific danger to public health and safety.”
“After documenting these hundreds of thousands of fentanyl pills which were distributed into Albuquerque, N.M., how can OPR say with certainty that there was no ‘specific danger to public health and safety?’” he wrote. “Not one person overdosed? Not one person died? Where is OPR’s evidence to support this claim?”
‘Endangered the public’
In a telephone interview Friday, Howell criticized the U.S. Attorney’s Office for prioritizing drug trafficking cases over public safety by allowing what could be millions of potentially lethal fentanyl pills to hit the streets.
“I can just tell you that we endangered the public because one pill can kill, and that’s objectively true, and we let hundreds of thousands and millions in aggregate hit the street, so therefore we got people killed,” he said.
Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham said in a statement June 25 she was “appalled” by the revelations and had asked New Mexico Attorney General Raúl Torrez “to investigate whether any federal agents broke state law when they allowed lethal drugs to remain on our streets, and to prosecute anyone responsible — regardless of whether they are a federal agent or not.”
“There are no words to describe how reckless and dangerous these decisions were,” Lujan Grisham said, adding, “the DEA knew people would die if these pills made it into New Mexico communities.”
Torrez announced a day later the opening of a formal investigation into allegations about the DEA operation.
He told Lujan Grisham in a response to her request, “I share your outrage, and I am committed to pursuing every appropriate legal avenue to hold the responsible parties accountable.”
The fallout comes as a second complaint has been filed by a retired DEA agent, Kevin Small, who contends he faced retaliation for supporting Howell.
Howell described Small as a “very credible” agent who worked at the DEA for 31 years.
“They’re bullies,” Howell said. “That’s what they do here, and that’s why other people aren’t coming forward, so they will bully you into submission.”
‘Focused on protecting’
DuBerry noted DEA employees in the state are New Mexicans who live and work in the communities the agency serves.
“We see the impact of the fentanyl crisis on our communities every day, and we remain focused on protecting New Mexicans by holding accountable the criminal organizations responsible for trafficking these deadly drugs,” she said in a statement.
She also pointed out combating fentanyl requires a coordinated effort among federal, state, local and tribal law enforcement partners.
“Federal law enforcement is uniquely positioned to investigate and prosecute transnational criminal organizations that operate across state and international borders,” she said, which allows federal authorities to target the leaders, networks and supply chains responsible for bringing fentanyl into New Mexico.
The U.S. Attorney’s Office continues to follow department guidance and makes enforcement decisions with public safety as the priority, DuBerry said.
“Our focus remains on reducing the availability of fentanyl and holding accountable the organizations responsible for trafficking these drugs,” she said.
‘Use their discretion’
The Office of Professional Responsibility’s report following Howell’s complaint pointed to “fentanyl guidance” issued in 2017, “in the wake of law enforcement’s increasing recognition of the significant dangers of even small quantities of fentanyl to public health.”
The guidance granted investigators and prosecutors leeway, the report said.
It allows teams conducting investigations using court-authorized wiretaps or electronic surveillance