CT man was head of a large-scale drug trafficking organization. He was sentenced to 10 years in federal prison

A man who federal officials say headed a large-scale drug trafficking operation in the Waterbury area has been sentenced to 10 years in federal prison.

Nestor Sosa-Ortiz, 39, of Waterbury faced sentencing Monday in federal court in New Haven, where a judge ordered his prison term be followed by five years of supervised release, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Connecticut.

Officials said Sosa-Ortiz was implicated in the trafficking of fentanyl and heroin following a joint investigation conducted by the DEA New Haven Task Force and the Waterbury Police Department. Authorities during the investigation used court-authorized wiretaps and physical surveillance and made multiple controlled purchases of narcotics, according to federal officials.

Authorities allege Sosa-Ortiz’s organization received large quantities of fentanyl and heroin from suppliers in Connecticut and New York and distributed the narcotics through a network of co-conspirators.

Federal officials also said Sosa-Ortiz, while incarcerated, used smuggled cell phones to communicate with several co-conspirators, including his sisters Imirici Sosa-Ortiz and Isamelis Sosa-Ortiz, following his May 2019 arrest in New York City on a separate federal heroin and fentanyl trafficking charge.

Nestor Sosa-Ortiz’s drug network used an apartment at 330 Bishop Street in Waterbury to store kilogram quantities of fentanyl and heroin, which were also processed and packaged for street sale in the apartment, according to federal officials.

Investigators carried out search warrants at the Bishop Street apartment and four other locations linked to the narcotics operation on October 29, 2019, seizing about six kilograms of fentanyl and heroin, 100,000 bags of fentanyl/heroin packaged for street distribution, 1,000 fentanyl pills disguised as Percocet pills, a firearm and about $50,000, according to federal officials. On the same day, multiple co-conspirators of Nestor Sosa-Ortiz were arrested.

Before his sentencing on Monday, Nestor Sosa-Ortiz had been held since May 18, 2019, on the federal New York charge, which was transferred to the District of Connecticut for prosecution. On June 18, 2020, he pleaded guilty to two counts of conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute one kilogram or more of heroin and 400 grams or more of fentanyl — charges that encompassed the investigations in New York and Connecticut.

A total of 17 individuals have been convicted in connection with the drug-trafficking operation. This included Imirici Sosa-Ortiz and Isamelis Sosa-Ortiz, who both pleaded guilty and were sentenced to 94 months in prison.