Feds: Firefighter set up big drug deals

ALBUQUERQUE (KRQE) - Steve Chavez should never have been hired as a firefighter given his background check and admission he sold marijuana for easy money, Albuquerque's fire chief said Friday in announcing the suspected major drug broker had been fired.

Also on Friday KRQE News 13 obtained the latest court records detailing Chavez's alleged role in a drug ring with high-level connections to the Sinaloa Cartel in Mexico.

Those records show federal agents believe huge amount of drugs and cash passed through his hands.

At an afternoon news conference Albuquerque Fire Department Chief Jim Breen released details of Chavez's application for the fire academy and background check in 2004. They showed he had seven traffic citations, failed to appear in court four times, had a charge of shoplifting and using a fake ID and Chavez admitted to selling pot for easy money.

That turned out to be an ominous admission. According to a federal search warrant unsealed Friday, Chavez went on to make stacks of easy money until he was busted in raids and a roundup of drug-ring suspects on Jan. 26.

Warrant documents allege Chavez often traveled to Florida to make huge cocaine deals and on one trip may have netted a $200,000 profit by arranging the sale of 20 kilos--44 pounds--of coke.

In another deal Chavez is accused of bartering a 3,000-pound mountain of marijuana for cocaine.

When the feds took down the local ring, they reported pulling an Uzi, AK-47 and other guns from the home where Chavez was staying and from his car.

The feds also say that Chavez and his wife recently bought a home near the Albuquerque Country Club and were in the process of remodeling it.

He is currently behind bars, and a federal judge has decided he will remain there until his trial. Fourteen other people were arrested in the federal bust.

Breen said the official reason Chavez was fired was his absence without leave for the last two weeks.