The Region - News from Aug. 14, 1985

A federal grand jury in San Diego indicted 24 people as alleged members of a cocaine and marijuana smuggling ring. The U.S. attorney’s office in San Diego said Donanciano Hernandez-Escarsega, believed to be the leader of the operation, was arrested last week in Montebello and is being held in lieu of $5-million bail. Two men suspected of being members of the ring also were arrested, the federal prosecutor’s office said, but the other 21 named in the indictment--including a Carlsbad man reputed to have been in charge of obtaining and operating the airplanes used to bring the drugs from Mexico to isolated desert landing areas in the United States--are still at large.