A 33-year-old man was sentenced to a decade in federal prison on Friday for dealing crack out of his Ballard Apartment. According to the Seattle911 blog, police found more than four and a half pounds of the drug in his apartment in the 6700 block of 24th Ave NW back in April. In September, Hector Castellanos-Cerrato pleaded guilty to dealing cocaine and has now received the mandatory minimum sentence. This isn’t the first time Castellanos-Cerrato has been accused of dealing drugs. He “previously faced drug distribution charges in King County, but fled to his native Honduras to avoid prosecution. Prosecutors contend he returned illegally to the U.S. and resumed drug trafficking,” the blog states. On Friday, the District Judge Richard A. Jones had these words for Castellanos-Cerrato, “When you return back to your country, please tell others who are thinking about the desire to come here, with the opportunity to sell illegal drugs, thinking this is a way to obtain a lavish lifestyle – let them know, there are grave consequences they face.” (Thanks Silver!)
Ballard crack dealer gets a decade in prison
Would you like a dictionary or thesaurus to go along with your decade sentence, Mr. Castellanos-Cerrato?
And, thanks to Judge Richard A. Jones for his message to this man.
The kind of 'neighbor' we could do without….
That used to be such a nice neighborhood.
These are the kind of landlords we could do without.
Thanks for allowing a distribution center for that poison to be set up in Ballard.
That idiot landlord should face charges as well.
So does he do the 10 years here, and then get deported?
excellent point!
any time i ever rented a place (including an apt. in downtown Ballard), i had to go through background and/or credit checks.
it's obvious this guy's landlord did neither.
or maybe he had no problem renting to someone with outsanding arrest warrants for drug dealing?
or maybe he was complicit?
That's the plan, but rarely the outcome. Most that actually get deported return.
This guy fled to avoid arrest/prosecution already, then returned to continue poisoning our neighborhood.
If you get released from jail in King County, I'd bet that your immigration status couldn't be used against you, and therefor you'd be released back into the hood.
It's shameful, and I can't believe that folks are so accepting of it.
Very glad they got this guy. My bus goes by there every day. Some of the apartments look perhaps a bit boring in that block but not really rundown. Hard to know whether the landlord could have prevented it or could possibly have known about it. I think this kinda of thing needs neighbors to be vigilant and report suspicious behavior(which indeed may have been the case)
Anyway, I'll take the 'win' as they say
a honduran. probably a connection the the gang that was kicked out of belltown last year. just movin' along.
This is tragic : ( He was just trying to make money. We need to decriminalize drugs!
Might as well, we are hard at decriminalizing everything else. >-/
Did he move to that location to be close to his clients and customer base?
You think he was telecommuting?
Ten years in an American prison constitutes “grave consequences”? Umm, not by Honduran standards.
Honduran, so maybe MS 13, like the gang members who tried to drag a Ballard High girl (and MS 13 member trying to get out) into a car about a month ago?
Sucks they are in Ballard. I was hoping they lived elsewhere and just did a little business here.
One down and a zillion to go. There are crack dealers all over Ballard and they aren't all Hondurans. It took us 2 1/2 years to encourage these scum (all white) on our street to move. And that's one block from West Woodland Elementary! Yes, you have to be vigilant and report suspicious activity Every. Single. Time. Again and again and AGAIN. Call the cops. File a NAR.
http://www.seattle.gov/police/contact/reporting…
Look up the address in the King County Parcel viewer and contact the building's owner.
http://www.kingcounty.gov/operations/GIS/PropRe…
Contact the DEA:
http://www.justice.gov/dea/submit_tip_form.htm
Learn how to work the system. Make a pest of yourself. It's frustrating as hell, but eventually you can make it too uncomfortable for these creeps to operate in your neighborhood. Then they'll go somewhere else and become somebody else's problem.
Yeah, decriminalize coke, so that the Mexican gangs that peeled a mans face off his head and sewed it to a soccer ball can really play some ball.
Making pot legal is one thing, making coke and heroin illegal only empowers some of the biggest scumbags you will ever meet in your life. Check out that other story about the girl who escaped the child smugglers while you're at it, hell, make child smuggling legal while you're at it, that way these guys won't be frowned upon next time they douse an unruly kid with gas and light the match.
Brilliant ideas here.
As for Hector, I wonder if it'd be legal to travel to Honduras and waste him the day he got home? May as well be, everything else is legal right?
No wonder America has been at war since Jan 17, 1991 but if you ask they think it started after 9/11. Morons, lol!
federal american prisons no less.
Hmmm, more than a little tin-foily.
Don't forget that these scumbags deal to willing buyers. There are two parties to blame here.
or maybe the apt wasn't in his name :)
FYI, just because something is run down doesn't mean its a haven for drugs or illegal behavior, and likewise just because something isn't run down doesn't mean all is legit inside. :) Don't judge a book by it's…you know the rest
Before I moved to Ballard (90s) I heard all the rumors about the area being infested with coke and crack-cocaine…its something Ballard has been dealing with for decades, and likely will continue to. It sounds like this guy was a big deal since he had that much weight on him, hopefully it'll make a dent in what is coming in and out of here. Or at least make Ballard too “hot” for awhile. Unfortunately drugs are everywhere, but we can be vigilant neighbors and call in suspicious activity and get to know everyone on your block.
In my very limited experience, the worst landlords tend to be among the house owners rather than the apartment owners. Too many people to call them on their BS if they try to run a whole apartment house that way … at least in neighborhoods where decent landlords are the rule rather than the exception.
HH: Not what I was saying…and I wasn't really 'judging'…BUT if a place is run down it speaks to at least a certain amount of neglect by the owners which 'might' translate into neglect in other areas.
In any case, my point was more that there is no way of US knowing whether the owner could have known about this issue. Regardless, glad he was caught.